


Little Red

by bagel_brother



Category: Little Witch Academia
Genre: Assumed Relationship, Everyone Thinks They're Together, Everyone basically - Freeform, F/F, Mind bond, Misunderstandings, Rating May Change, Telepathy, aka the masked emotions fic no one asked for, akko with characterised parents, anger issues akko, be warned sort of weird dynamic, i wrote this to make me happy bonus points if it makes u happy, idk where im going with this tbh, my gosh i cut myself on the edge
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-26
Updated: 2021-02-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:48:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 26,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26126026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bagel_brother/pseuds/bagel_brother
Summary: Speaking the seventh word comes with an unknown price - a mind link that makes sure there are no secrets between the two who have it.Diana figures it out before Akko. How?Well, she just follows the endless trail of emotions of course.
Relationships: Diana Cavendish/Atsuko "Akko" Kagari
Comments: 26
Kudos: 186





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> warning: this has not been edited. be on the lookout for typos, run-on sentences, and just bad writing in general.

Akko comes in the nick of time, watches as Ms Ursu- as _Chariot_ falls through the air, surrounded by Croix’s robot cubes.

She’s never been that good of a witch, driven more by sheer willpower than raw technical talent, so she gathers up all of her anger and her frustration and her hate (and it seems to be limitless, this rolling wave of red inside her), and she pours it out into the first of the seven words, watches as the wand glows in response –

“ _Noctu Orfei Aude Fraetor!”_

And opens her eyes at the last word in time to see the wand transform into the bow she fell in love with all those years ago. “ _Shiny,_ ” She screams, pouring even more of her anger into the pure beam of energy she’s formed into an arrow, “ _Arc_!”

When she lets go, it’s like the white-hot heat of her frustrations have cooled down a bit into blue flame.

Instinctively, she’s always powered her magic with her emotion, so it doesn’t come as much of a surprise to her when she discovers that she can only use Shiny Rod, the only magic she has that isn’t as much of a fuck-up, when she’s at her most emotional. It doesn’t come as a surprise either when she discovers that her _most emotional_ translates to _pissed off_. Which is fine. Because lately, she’s had a lot of anger to give.

Her gaze lands on Chariot.

A _lot_.

But it had been like this for her since forever, anyway.

Akko had always had trouble controlling her temper. It had come in flares and bursts, a violent edge no time-outs or missed dinners could curb. Her mother would scream at her, her father would stare her down, the three of them fuelling the circle of hatred because Akko had inherited her temper from _someone_ and it certainly hadn’t been any of her grandparents.

And what a family they made! Broken plates and scuffed up walls – once, the neighbours had called the police on them in fear of domestic violence, but the policemen had relented, if only because someone on the force was close friends with her mother.

_Those are the Kagaris_ for you, the policeman had said, chuckling heartily. _A family with loud words, and a lot of heart._

But that last statement had never been true, was only made to look like it when Akko had turned six – when she’d been forced to properly control her anger. She’d never thought it would happen of course, since their family was ragged around the edges, all of them dropping outside pretences the minute they stepped into the house. All of them too petty and selfish to give in to each other.

Except she’d been wrong because one day, the day of the ultimate _snap_ , her mother had shattered their last good porcelain bowl, pointed at her husband and at her daughter, and screamed,

“All right! That’s _it_!”

Akko and Mr Kagari had stopped mid-argument to look at her simultaneously, eyes promising hell unless she immediately got to the point. He looked at the bowl and scowled. “ _Honey_ ,” he said, spitting venom out along with the word, “That was new.”

She ignored him. “Listen up. We are going to at least _stop_ with the temper tantrums because there are only so many times we can get the police called on us. Mark will get suspicious at some point, _dear_ ,” she said mockingly, injecting as much poison into the word as Mr Kagari had done with his endearment, “And I can’t fucking stand the neighbours’ wailing anymore.”

A moment as all three of them considered this.

Mr Kagari, for once in his life, didn’t shoot her down with more sarcasm or dry wit. He considered what she said. Then he considered the fact that he’d be the first suspect of domestic violence if it came to the police, simply because he was a man, considered the other more important fact that he slept in the same bed as his wife and that she had access to veritable poison because of her work at the pharmacy – and slowly nodded. Never let it be said that Mr Kagari was a stupid man.

His daughter however… he looked down at her where she was holding very firmly onto her fake Witch’s broom, something he’d been trying to pull out of her hands just a minute ago. Crouching a little so she could see his eyes better, he asked, 

“Akko. Do you understand?” 

She faced him defiantly, and stuck his tongue out at him. He could physically feel a vein pop out on his forehead. “Akko-”

“Akko,” Ms Kagari said, voice deceptively sweet. “If you do not pretend along with us, I will burn everything you own that has that stupid witch’s face on it, and I will send you off to that boarding school in Osaka. Not a magic school. Not Luna Nova. _Osaka_.”

He watched impassively as the two women squared off. Akko had gotten his eyes maybe, and his glare, but she had inherited her mother’s vindictiveness, as well as her ruthlessness. He had no doubt whatsoever that his wife wouldn’t hesitate to carry out the threat.

But six-year-old Akko wasn’t stupid, and she understood this too. So, she averted her eyes, nodded once, and walked off to her room.

Once inside she kicked a new scuff mark into the wall and screamed, taking care to make as little noise as possible.

Despite her best efforts, Akko had slipped a lot that year, unleashing her temper as little six year olds were wont to do. Her most prized _Chariot_ merchandise items burned with each mistake. A thrown spoon lead to a ruined poster, a ripped pair of leggings lead to a crushed doll – it was only after the rarest _Chariot_ card in her collection went missing did she finally stop throwing her little temper tantrums.

Or at least, she learned to hide them a bit better.

Smiles and being obnoxious. She was good at that. No one looked twice at the clumsy moron and if being seen as reckless and impulsive lead to her being able to do whatever she wanted to curb the sharp edges of anger she had constantly poking at her insides, then _good enough_. She forced herself to laugh whenever she started to feel the beginnings of a scream try to work its way out of her lungs, forced herself to grin instead of baring her teeth.

Somehow, it led to her cultivating this… this weird scatter-brained optimistic persona. She hadn’t meant for it to happen – but being naturally clumsy on top of everything else had helped along the process of people writing her off as a hapless idiot.

_Whatever_ , she thought, fiddling with her limited-edition Shiny Chariot action figures. _I_ am _a hapless idiot. I’m fine with them thinking that, just as long as they don’t think I’m an angry one._

And then eventually she held her temper all the time, not because of what her mother and father would do, but because of how others reacted to her.

She didn’t hate everyone around her, not truly. They were annoying more often than not, and sometimes they made her want to grab and twist until they were screaming as loud as she was – but she still liked being around them. To be sociable was to be approachable and it was hard to be approachable when people saw you as an unstable bomb.

So, she kept at it. Kept it going, treated her anger only when she was alone and there were things to break, and she never snapped. 

But right now.

At this moment.

Oh, she’d never wanted to break her own rules _more_.

Her anger brimmed to the surface like it never had before, and she counted herself _lucky_ Croix’s inventions were out of commission because she was sure if the cubes hovered around her they would only bring out dark red fury. For the first time in ages it was hard to fix her mask in place and settle the edges of her mouth. Out of the corner of her eyes she noticed Amanda noticing her displeasure, noticed the rest of her friends doing the same thing, and somehow that made it so so _hard_ to smile (how long had it been since she’d had actual trouble?).

She didn’t, however, notice Diana widening her eyes imperceptibly, not only in shock, but in bewildered understanding.

_Just… focus. If you could just…_

It’s very, _very_ difficult, to curl her lips ever so gently up at the edges so her smile looks genuine instead of fake, soft instead of mocking. She plays it off well, and she pats herself on the back when they all seem to buy it. Hot tears of frustration spring to the corners of her eyes when she does this and she plays that off to her advantage too, uses it to add more sincerity to her words.

“Akko…”

Chariot says softly, eyes impossibly sad.

_You don’t get to look at me like that,_ Akko thinks, _you don’t get to pity me_.

And even though it makes nausea bubble up in the pits of her stomach she widens her smile and uses her anger to soften her face the way she’s been practicing since she was six. “Chariot. It really is you.”

Her words sound a bit flat to her ears at first and she uses them as a reference of what _not_ to sound like. Then she pulls a speech out of her ass so cute and wholesome and kind it’s a wonder she doesn’t throw up all over the forest floor. 

Diana observes, and stays silent.

\---

It’s night. The courtyard is dark. A week’s passed since they’d saved the city from the missile, since magic re-introduced itself to the world in a path of twisting branches. The translucent limbs of Yggdrasil are almost clear on nights like this, when the moon is full.

Akko reclined a little on her bench, too keyed-up to sleep, too cautious to scream the way she wanted to. It was past curfew so no one was around anyway, but she didn’t want to risk waking anyone up.

“Akko.”

“Gah!” She screeched, jerking and then quickly clasping a hand around her mouth, waiting with bated breath for her voice to- not echo?

Diana sighed, letting her hand fall, glowing wand still clasped in it.

“I cast a silencing ward around us. God knows you need one around you at all times.”

Akko grinned, nonplussed. “Oh! Smart!” She looked at Diana, took in the blonde’s usual icy stare. “Why are you out, Diana? It’s past curfew and you’re breaking the rules~” She sang the last part out teasingly, even as she moved a little so that there was more space on the bench for the blonde to sit.

Diana eyed the space for a few seconds, then took it, turning her eyes up to the Yggdrasil branches in parallel to what Akko was doing. “I wanted to talk to you about something, actually. You were not in your room, so I followed your psychic footprints.”

Akko wrinkled her nose, biting down on a quick flash of anger. If she’d paid better attention she would have noted Diana’s hand twitch slightly. “I have psychic footprints?”

Diana sighed. “If you didn’t sleep in Legal Magic Studies class…”

“Okay, okay, no need for the lecture.” Akko whined, kicking her heels out a little. She tilted her head and turned to face Diana, curious. “Hey, what’s my psychic footprint even like?”

There was a moment of silence. The blonde witch beside her chose her words carefully.

“It’s very… red.”

Akko stilled.

Diana was still looking at the branches of the tree, picking out green tendrils of power here and there.

“Which is what I wanted to talk to you about, actually.”

“Hmm?”

“Akko.” She met the brunette’s gaze, blue eyes honest and searching, “Why are you so angry all the time?”

Akko bared her teeth, then tried to turn it into a grin. “What do you mean?”

“Please don’t pretend. You’re angry. All the time. It’s very… confusing.” Diana paused, unsure how to go about it. “Not to mention _distracting_.”

The brunette dropped the grin, eyebrows furrowing. Everything about that sentence made sense, except for that last part…

“Distracting?” she asked, “What do you mean, distracting?”

Diana sighed, flicking her eyes down to Akko’s hands first, then back to her face, taking in the disconcerting hatred that swirled in those irises, so at odds with her ever-present smile.

“I’m sorry, I should have told you this sooner – Akko, ever since we shot that missile down together I’ve sort of been able to feel… imprints, of your emotion. Like we have a telepathic bond and I’m getting bleed through of your feelings.”

The brunette definitely wasn’t smiling now.

“A telepathic bond.” She said flatly, voice disapproving. “And you failed to mention this sooner because…?”

“Because I didn’t know what it was in the first place.” Diana said, fingers twitching again when she felt a pulse of rage through what she now knew to be the bridge between her mind and Akko’s. “I thought they were _my_ emotions at first, but the longer that didn’t make sense, the more research I did, and… well-”

Diana sighed again, averting her gaze because the ability to both feel and _see_ the anger in Akko was too much. “It’s the _Claiomh Solais_. We used it together, and the emotional tie we had when we used the Seventh Word never wore off.”

Another surge of rage, hotter this time, almost impossibly so. “Never wore off?” Akko asked, voice a near-growl. “What do you mean it never wore off? So we had an emotional tie _during_ the spell-casting?”

The blonde nodded, meeting Akko’s stare head on. “Even then, the anger you had was unprecedented-”

“And exactly where the _fuck_ do you get off, telling me what to feel, huh?” Akko exploded, the parts of her she’d so carefully kept in check falling apart under blue eyes and a white moon. “Especially now, knowing that you’ve been – that you’ve been _spying_ on my thoughts, ignoring my privacy! I pay attention to _Legal Magic Studies_ princess,” she spat out mockingly, “And I know what the penalties of an unwanted psychic bond are.”

Diana’s eyes widened. This was – Akko had never raged at her like this before, not even on the day when she’d tried to get Diana to go back to Luna Nova, not when Barbara and Hannah had kept provoking her – and her anger was – _not the time, Diana,_ she chided.

She quickly tried to explain, “No not coherent thoughts, just feelings and impressions of emotion – and just so we’re clear, I did not want the telepathic bond either, I was just as unaware that it would form-”

“Yeah you _didn’t want it_ ,” Akko sneered, “That’s why you didn’t tell me it had formed in the first place, or that you could literally _feel what I felt_ ,” and then _another_ wave of anger rolled over the bond, completely overwhelming a part of her brain – how was she still so angry? “And hey!”

Akko pointed an accusing finger at her. “How come I can’t feel anything off of you?”

Diana chose her words even more carefully this time, mindful of the unending ripples of emotion ripping its way through her mind, “I read more about it when it seemed like you had not been affected nearly as much as I had been.” Understatement of the year. It had taken _days_ to get used to Akko’s bouts of torrential rage. “It appears that between a telepathically bonded duo, an individual whose mind is more… _full_ will have a harder time clearing it enough to successfully get a read on his or her partner’s psyche.”

The witch across her narrowed her eyes in suspicion. “You’re saying it’s my own fault?”

Diana flinched, waiting for the impending wave of fury… and felt nothing. How odd.

“Not exactly. Your mind is simply more active than I could have anticipated.”

Because nothing in Diana’s fifteen years of age could have prepared her for _this_.

\---

As a child, Diana Cavendish had learned all about masks.

You always had to learn about something before you perfected the art of creating it, after all. Her mother’s was cracked and blistered from illness, and sometimes if she squinted she’d be able to see the weariness peeking out from layers of impossible kindness. Her aunt almost never even bothered with hers, choosing instead to forego it to better show off her cruelty – almost like a warning sign, like the colours of a snake saying _do not cross me_. Andrew had perfected his before her, had made it perfect enough that it really did look like he cared about nothing – but she’d seen the tiniest of cracks splinter the skin around his eyes when his father had gleefully announced that his son had given up on playing the piano.

But Diana… she’d taken a while to form hers. At first, she hadn’t even thought it would be needed. With absolutely no hesitation at all she’d plunged straight into practicing magic, crying when she couldn’t do a spell right, bursting into unrestrained laughter when she did. Her aunts had mocked her, Andrew ignored her, the children watching jeered and laughed and made fun of the bygone era of magic, and she hadn’t cared – until her mother died, that is. Her protection along with her.

And then, all of a sudden, her mask was everything. Perfecting her magic had turned into an obligation that overshadowed her passion. She raised her reputation, trained herself to wear the polite smile that wasn’t too cold or too warm. She shook hands with the children of other members of royalty, the children of politicians, and she’d barely blinked as she locked away her stupid ( _not stupid_ ) childish Shiny Chariot toys away because she knew it was time to grow up.

In her world, strength and presence were _everything_ , and to be seen as weak was to be devoured.

But a single moment of weakness, of pure hatred for the cold walls of her castle and her mother’s dying legacy, that was all it took for her to sign up for Luna Nova. The same school Shiny Chariot had gone to, a school for witches and for the magic she had loved so much for so long.

_‘I’ll let myself have this one thing,’_ she thought, relishing in the cold air as she flew, _‘Just this one thing, and then I’ll be perfect.’_

She didn’t have any particularly strong feelings towards the other students at Luna Nova at first. Akko, the new student who wasn’t from a witch family, wasn’t even a variable. She’d only felt mild annoyance at the brunette for ruining orientation, and then mild frustration when Akko had failed to move the statue, and _then_ sort-of-not-mild indignation when she’d claimed to have Shiny Chariot’s actual wand. Because who was this – this _commoner_ , to say that she was special enough to hold Shiny Rod?

Then, the event with the Pappiliodya.

Then, the event with the sacrificial ceremony.

Even the little things she’d heard about the girl in between – things like granting the principal’s father rest, scaring poachers off of endangered fish in their lake, participating in the Hunt, they were all _different_ types of magic – but they were different in a good way. Not perfect, but undeniably good.

And so, after the annoyance and the frustration and the indignation came the jealousy.

The stubborn little witch wouldn’t even let her leave the school. _Rivals_? Please. They’d never been on the same level to begin with.

_But who’s higher, I wonder?_

The point was, that Diana had never known someone as unique and as different as Atsuko Kagari, as naïve or as reckless… or as stubbornly helpful as Akko, as comfortingly transparent as this brunette girl who wore her heart on her sleeve and kept her sleeves permanently rolled-up. Akko had no mask.

_Except_.

Except, that was what Diana had thought of Akko, before she’d seen her talk to Professor Ursula, finally revealed as Shiny Chariot (And hadn’t _that_ stung, knowing that your idol had chosen someone else over you, knowing that your suspicions about her magic being special were grounded in truth). Because Akko, in that moment, looked like she was taping up a _mask_.

Diana knew masks. She’d spent most of her life wearing them. Akko was not supposed to be the same.

_Anger_? She mused to herself, watching the brunette’s smile become distorted for a few seconds before fixing itself. _But that’s impossible. Akko isn’t petty, she’d never-_

Diana watched carefully. _Would she?_

Casting a spell together using the Claiomh Solais was extremely difficult. Not because of the spell itself, though that was by no means effortless – it was difficult because of the emotional bond they’d somehow formed in the middle of casting it. Diana had felt triumphant, awed by the sight of the branches of Yggdrasil, stunned into silence by the solemn beauty of space, the most ecstatic she’d ever felt one second – and then the most overwhelmed she’d felt the next.

_What is this?!_ She wondered to herself, gritting her teeth against the pure intensity of the hatred that washed through her brain. _Where is this coming from? Is it Croix’s magic missile? The wand?_

But no, that was impossible, the missile was destroyed. The wand wasn’t malevolent, wasn’t capable of creating emotion. _Then what_ -

Her inner thoughts had cut off abruptly when she’d turned to look at Akko.

The brunette had an expression on her face unlike anything she’d ever seen before. Her lips weren’t outwardly frowning, not the deep exaggeration of anger she’d seen countless times before, but they were pressed together, the edges quirked ever so slightly downwards.

She was staring straight down at the world below them, not a trace of the wonderment Diana felt swimming around in their depths.

Once, Diana’s mother had told her the eyes were the window to the soul. Akko’s were the gaping holes of an empty house.

_Well_ , Diana mused, wincing minutely as another wave of fury washed over her. _Maybe not completely empty._

But what did she even have to be angry about? Why was she so –

And then just like that, the expression was gone, wiped away like grime from a mirror. When Akko turned to face her, she had the same familiar goofy grin, the same raised eyebrows and the excited shine of triumph in her eyes.

Diana would have bought it completely and wholeheartedly were it not for the bond and the fury that simmered insistently beneath it.

“Akko…” she murmured, reaching out a hand.

“I know.” Akko said, excited, splaying her hands out. “We saved the world, Diana! We actually did it!” she cheered, laughing as she pulled the blonde towards her in a crushing hug.

Diana hugged her back, a little tentatively at first and then a little more genuinely when she didn’t feel a responding pulse of anger, pushing all of her recent discoveries to the back of her mind so she could focus on the _now_. Because in the _now_ , their city was safe, Yggdrasil was alive, and space was gorgeous.

She studied Akko’s eyes a little when they touched down on the ground, searching for that little hint of emptiness. There was nothing.

At night, in the privacy of her own bedroom, she closed her eyes and imagined Akko all over again. The smallest frown tugging her lips down, the blank gaze.

And then quietly, and _only_ in the privacy of her own bedroom, Diana decided that out of all the emotions Akko wore, her anger was the most beautiful.

\---

The following week passed by somewhat normally. She was sitting in the cafeteria at lunch for once, eating at a table housing the blue team and some of their friends instead of gallivanting off somewhere to help the teachers decode the last of the Dwarvish script for one of the older archive artefacts.

“I’m just saying,” Hannah said, jabbing a French fry in Barbara’s direction. “If you weren’t so hung up on potion-making you’d actually be able to pass languages.”

Barbara groaned in response, nearly face-planting in her mashed potatoes. “But potion-making is my worst subject! I’m already _fine_ with languages, I don’t need to expend anymore trouble on it, that’s so much wo~rk.” She whined, dragging the last word out. “Can’t the teachers just pass their students after they perfect their first exam?”

Hannah smiled sympathetically. “You’ll do fine, Barbara. If you want, we could study together later? I need to brush up on languages too.”

“Oh, you’re an angel.”

Diana looked up from her tater tots to face the duo. “I have notes that might be of help, should you have need of them.” She dipped a tater tot in the dismal red sauce their cafeteria passed for ketchup. “I could give them to you later.”

Hannah grinned admiringly. “As expected of someone as studious as you, Diana!” She turned to Barbara. “So?”

Barbara shrugged a shoulder up. “Sure, why not. Thanks Diana.”

“Hey,” Hannah chided gently, “You could stand to sound a little more grateful you know, Diana’s-”

It was at this moment Akko chose to burst into the cafeteria in an explosion of sound, plates crashing in her wake along with the unfortunate busboy goblin she’d pulled down with her. There was a slight screeching noise as she face-planted solidly on the floor.

Lotte and Sucy walked in behind her, chatting idly while they stepped over her motionless body. Other students entering the cafeteria followed suit. At her table, Barbara and Hannah had barely looked up before resuming conversation.

“I’m so sorry!” Akko’s voice floated over from where she’d fallen. Diana watched as she bumbled about and made a general mess of herself trying to help the goblin pick up the glass shards.

“Is no one going to try to help her?” Diana asked bemusedly, wondering why even Lotte, being the more compassionate of the red team, was ignoring the commotion.

“Who?” Barbara replied, eyebrows furrowing. She turned to look at what Diana was staring at. “Oh, you mean Akko?”

Hannah snorted. “People generally stopped trying to help after the hundredth time.”

“The hundredth time?” Diana repeated, incredulous. “Does this happen every lunch period?”

Hannah took a second to look up from her mashed potatoes. “Pretty much, yeah.”

“I guess you never see it happen because you’re usually off helping the teachers, right Diana?”

Diana hummed in a generally assenting noise, watching as Akko continued to try picking up the pieces of each broken plate. It was only when she watched the brunette flinch, hastily pulling a finger back and sucking in air, did Diana stand up, ready to go –

The anger that rolled across her spine was _stunning_. She tried not to sway as she stood, brute forcing her way through the red haze.

It’s not hers, this foreign emotion, that much she can tell, but it seems familiar somehow, like she’d experienced it beforehand. During-

“Diana?” Hannah prods her. “You okay?”

The blonde steadied herself, locking the emotion off as tightly as possible and steeling herself. “Of course, I was just – I’m going to go help Akko.”

“Ehh?” Barbara waved a hand. “You’re great for doing it Diana, but it really is sort of useless to help her. Everyone’s used to it so it’s more of a hassle to help her at this point.”

“Well, _I’m_ not used to it.” Diana snapped. At the widened eyes of her roommates she coughed, immediately softening her voice. The anger was setting her nerves a bit on edge. “I’ll just go make sure she hasn’t cut herself on the glass.”

“Diana’s too nice.” Hannah sighed, when she thought the blonde was out of earshot. Diana kept on, acting like she hadn’t heard anything.

“Akko?”

The brunette looked up at her, eyes widening. “Diana! You’re actually here for lunch!” She straightened up out of her crouch to go for a hug, and only succeeded in accidentally kicking out more glass shards away from her. “Crap – sorry Mr Goblin I’ll-”

Diana sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. In one smooth motion, she had her wand out at the ready, levitation spell on her lips.

“Wow, Diana, I didn’t know you could do that!” Akko crowed, watching as shards flew into the air, beginning a uniform march to the bins.

Diana sighed. “It’s something anyone here should have been able to do if they’d bothered trying to help.”

“Eh.” The brunette waved a hand flippantly. “Happens all the time anyway, they knew I’d be able to fix things up.”

Diana caught her hand mid-air, examining it closely. “Akko, you’re bleeding.”

“I am?”

“ _Akko_.”

“I didn’t notice!” She cried out defensively, trying and failing to tug her hand out of Diana’s grip. “I was picking up the plates and-”

“And you must have cut yourself while you were doing it.” Diana sighed again. “Honestly, Akko. All right, I’m taking you to the infirmary.”

A flash of anger _again_ , but sharper this time, like it was more concentrated, warmer. There was no mistaking the familiarity now, the way it made her spine shiver like it did during the casting of the spell that stopped the missile, saved their cities. But that meant – that meant it must be coming from –

“Ah! There’s no need to go to the infirmary Diana it’s just a small cut!”

Akko? Was she mad because of something like this?

But _this_ level of anger over something so petty…

“Small cuts can still get _infected_ , Akko. Come on, I’ll make sure they at least take care of it quickly.”

The brunette grumbled a little more but allowed herself to be brought to a stand, following close behind Diana and bowing out an apology to the goblin she’d knocked over as she passed him. Lotte and Sucy turned to face her as she walked out, but she waved them off, shooting them her trademark smile.

The walk there was not as silent as she’d hoped it would be, but she found out that making small approving noises was just about enough to get Akko to carry the entire conversation. It was rude to zone out while people were talking to you but she needed to concentrate, tug at the bonds she was now sure were attached to her mind, see if she could seek out that breath-taking anger again…

“Diana? Diana, are you listening?”

There! Almost comforting in its familiarity but no less intense, the anger was back, secluded to a corner so Diana could make sure none of it tinged her own thoughts. Akko tugged on her sleeve, breaking her out of her reverie.

“Diana?”

“Akko?” She replied, a little confused. _Why are you so angry all the time_?

But she couldn’t say that.

“I’m sorry, I don’t think I caught that. What was it you said?”

Akko fake-huffed, puffing a cheek out, then stretched her mouth back into an easy smile. All while the anger festered.

_I don’t understand you, Akko_.

“I said, how come you’re at lunch today?”

“The teachers had no need of my service today.”

Akko’s mouth formed an ‘o’ of surprise. “Is _that_ why you never come to lunch?” At Diana’s nod, she continued, admiring, “Wow, you really are amazing.”

And it was different, coming from Akko, when her eyes were as open as honest as they were now. Diana forced down the blush, turning to face the infirmary to hide her smile. “We’re here, Akko. Get on the bed while I go look for the nurse.”

“How forward of you Cavendish, at least take me to dinner first.”

“ _Akko_.”

“I’m doing it, I’m doing it.”

Diana looked around the infirmary, but it was completely empty. A quick peek at the nurse’s desk confirmed that, yes, staff were out for their lunch break and if the students could just wait until they get back…

She sighed, returning to the bed where Akko sat upright, swinging her feet absentmindedly.

“The school nurse is away on her lunch break, I’m afraid. We should wait here until she returns, it will only be five minutes.”

Akko grumbled. “But fifteen minutes is enough for two servings Diana! I need the nutrition, classes are already killing half of my brain cells!”

“Oh, all two of them?” she muttered almost inaudibly under her breath.

“ _I heard that!_ ”

Diana sighed, a little exasperated but well aware of the brunette’s penchant for eating almost impossible amounts of food. “All right. If you’re okay with it, I could try-”

“Besides,” Akko continued, barrelling over her, “I can just heal myself anyway!”

This made Diana pause. “What?”

“I _did_ mean it when I said it was just a small cut. I’ve got plenty of experience with small cuts.”

This time when Diana felt Akko’s emotions leak she deliberately reached up to the bond, prodding at the bridge that tethered them together before letting the girl’s feelings pass through. There it was, the ever-present anger, combined with a little bit of frustration, a pinch of impatience…

“And why,” Diana said, clearing her throat, shaking her head as if to physically clear it of all the extra emotion, “Why do you know how to do that?”

Akko smiled again, expression belaying nothing of what she felt. “I get cut up all the time! Thought it was about time I learned, even if it’s only a small one and it only works half the time.”

Diana stood there, contemplating the brunette. “Even so… don’t take this the wrong way, but I believe I should be the one to do it. The healing spell _is_ one of the first things my mother taught me how to do.”

Akko shrugged, even as a flash of irritation zipped by. “Yeah, all right. You’re the expert on this I guess.”

The blonde frowned, but waved her wand over the wounds, watching as some of the tension in Akko’s shoulders left when they closed up. “Akko…”

“Yes, Diana?”

“Are you-” she licked her lips, staring straight into red, searching for any crack in what was undoubtedly a mask, “Are you cross with me?”

“No!” Akko cried, even as her eyes, expressive, open eyes, remained the same, “Of course not! Why would you think that?”

Diana chewed lightly on her lip, considering. “It was nothing you said, just a feeling. Don’t worry. Oh look, the nurse is here. I’ll leave you in her capable hands for now, Akko.” The brunette spluttered at the abrupt end of their conversation, face the picture of confusion even as nothing crossed the mental bridge of their bond into Diana’s head, and she took a few more steps back. “And don’t worry about any missed lunch either, I’ll bring you something during your free period.”

Not waiting to see if Akko would respond, Diana turned tail and fled – or at least, she walked away as fast as she could without running. She was probably being rude, she thought to herself as she informed the nurse of what she had done. This wasn’t the right way to handle things.

But she didn’t care.

Because Akko was _lying_. Akko was lying, every overlapping emotion in Diana’s brain evidence enough of this. This would have been enough to disturb her on its own, but –

But Akko was lying, and Diana had paid very close attention, and she hadn’t been able to tell.

She shook her head. Everything about Akko was giving her a headache, recently. The contrasting internal conflict to her outward appearance, the _anger_ , seemingly limitless, where was all of it even coming from?

Diana sighed. She’d get to the bottom of this somehow, and if it meant exploiting the telepathic bond they’d somehow formed between them for all it was worth, then so be it.

\---

_What to do_ , Akko mused to herself, _about Cavendish._

To learn that the blonde had been listening in the whole time, drowning in the wave of red Akko always made sure to keep in check… the thought disgusted her, and a corner of her lips pulled downwards before she hastily perked it back up again.

They were out on the field during break time as usual, the red team and the green team, bathing in the last few days of sun before winter decided to rear its ugly head.

“Jasminka!” Amanda called out from where she’d been flying upside down, about twenty feet off the ground. “Snack!”

The tall girl just smiled in reply, and reared her hand back, launching a cookie straight up into the air. Amanda zipped by in time to have it land smack dab in the middle of her mouth.

“Awefum!” The American witch crowed, turning a loop in celebration. “That was at _least_ twenty feet! Did you see that, Akko?”

_How long did she say she’d known? Since the spell. Since… a week ago? More than that?_

“Akko?”

_I’m going to **fucking-**_

****

“Akko!”

Akko looked up suddenly, straight into the green eyes of one Amanda O’Neill. She felt her eyebrows unconsciously furrowing and quickly straightened them out.

“Whatsit?”

Amanda didn’t seem to notice anything wrong, grinning and circling around the brunette. “I just beat your cookie record plebeian. Bow down to the new champion!”

Akko felt the slightest flash of anger lick at her toes, but she welcomed it fully and without shame. This one was harmless, more humour-driven than anything. “Nuh-uh. There’s no way you did more than 15 feet.”

“It’s true!” Amanda stuck her tongue out, swaying side to side. “20 feet, maybe even more. Ask Jasminka.”

They both turned to look at the tall girl contentedly munching on a newly opened bag of chips. She looked up, guileless innocent smile on her face.

Amanda inwardly sweat dropped.

“Well, 20 feet or not you’re about to watch me set a new record.” Before Amanda could reply, Akko had grabbed the broom she’d put next to her, zipping straight up into the sky with shaky ease. “Eat my fucking dust O’Neill! Jasminka, cookie!”

Jasminka only hummed in assent as Amanda swore, diving after Akko to try to throw her off track.

On the ground, Constanze was tinkering with one of Jasminka’s panini makers, trying to get it to toast a sandwich to the level of _not_ black cancer. Beside her Lotte and Sucy lounged under the shade of a tree, unabashedly taking from Jasminka’s seemingly endless supply of food.

“Sucy…”

“Mm?” Sucy grunted absentmindedly, carefully cleaning the mushrooms they’d found on one of their field trips the earlier in the day.

“Do you think Akko’s been acting a little weird lately?”

The pale witch frowned. “She’s always weird.”

Lotte exhaled, taking her glasses off to polish them. “Not like that. I mean – like yesterday, she didn’t talk much during movie night. And it was _Twilight_ , you know how much she loves to talk during Twilight.”

“Maybe she’s finally learning how to watch a movie.”

“ _Sucy_.”

The other witch sighed, finally putting one of her mushrooms down. “I know, I know.”

“And today too. It’s like she’s distracted all the time now – just before, with Amanda-”

“Lotte.” Sucy sighed again, picking another mushroom up. “Don’t you think you’re reading a little too much into this?”

Lotte furrowed her brows. “I don’t know. I just hate to think that something might be bothering Akko and we never noticed.”

“It’s _Akko_. She’d be a lot more obvious about something that was-”

“ _Akko_.”

A voice cut through everything on the field, from Lotte’s conversation to the screaming match the two witches were having on brooms, 10 feet in the air.

It didn’t _shout_ the word, but the effect might as well have been the same.

Diana Cavendish stood nearby, shading her eyes as she looked into the sky. “Akko, I need to talk to you.”

Her face was too far away to make out, but Lotte could have sworn she saw Akko frown.

“Do you really?”

Lotte raised her eyebrows in surprise, watching from a distance as Amanda did the same.

“Akko, please.”

“Why?”

“You _know_ why.”

Lotte exchanged confused glances with Sucy. The weirdest thing about this wasn’t the fact that Akko and Diana were acting eerily similar to the way they were earlier in the year, before they’d grown impossibly friendly.

The weirdest thing was that _Akko_ , of all people, was the one deliberately trying to ignore Diana.

“Oi, Cavendish! What do you need her for?” Amanda called out, briefly flipping upside down. Diana barely spared her a glance, boring piercing blue eyes into Akko’s head.

“It’s nothing, Amanda. I just need to-”

“Oh wow, look at that you wore me down, haha!” Akko exclaimed, swooping low towards the ground on her broomstick. Her trademark smile was back on her face, but there was something – off about it, Lotte mused. Like too many teeth showing.

“Wh-” Diana stuttered, looking at the hand encircled around her forearm. “What?”

“Just joking around with you Diana, lighten up!” Akko said, as she dismounted from her broom. She turned her head slightly to shout, “ _Don’t even think about beating my record without me to watch!_ ” at Amanda before dragging the blonde off to Mother knows where.

Lotte frowned. “ _That_ was weird. Wasn’t it, Sucy?”

Sucy shrugged, already occupied with another mushroom. “Sounded obvious to me.”

Amanda flew over to them, skidding to a stop in mid-air. “What sounded obvious to you? Did Diana piss Kagari off or something?”

“But Akko isn’t the type to get mad about things…” Lotte murmured, buffing at a particularly tough smudge of dirt on her glasses.

“Honestly Lotte, you should know this after reading all of those weird Night Fall books.”

“Know what?”

“That they were having a lover’s spat.”

Lotte accidentally cracked one of the glasses’ lens. Amanda, previously balanced on her broom with one foot, slipped off and face-planted in the dirt.

“EH?” The two gingers screamed in unison, eyes wide and disbelieving. Lotte stammered out a, “Sucy, that’s – even _if_ they were dating they’d-”

Amanda was much more coherent with her protests. “Yeah, like perfect _Diana_ would go for Akko. She’d probably be too scared Akko would like, I dunno, bring her GPA down just by being near her.”

Lotte stopped stammering and side-eyed the American. “That’s a little unfair, Amanda, Diana wouldn’t think that way…”

“Fine whatever, but she wouldn’t date _Akko_.”

“I – but they get along just _fine_ for-” Finding no argument, Lotte just sighed and put her glasses away, resigning herself to a day of blurry vision.

“Both of you are blind. And one of you’s wearing eyeglasses already.” Sucy cackled as she dumped her mushrooms into an empty glass jar. “There’s no way that wasn’t a lover’s spat.”

“Akko. And Diana.” Amanda snorted and brushed dirt off her face. “If that’s true I’ll eat my broom.”

Sucy’s eyes glinted, teeth sharpening to a-

“Sucy _no_.”

\---

“Diana.” Akko said, voice bordering on the edge of impatient. “Where are you taking me?”

“Somewhere we can talk in private.”

“Right. Because all of a sudden privacy is what’s important to you.”

“Akko-”

“Do you know the _one thing_ that’s supposed to be mine Diana?” They were in one of Luna Nova’s hallways, one of the rarely used ones that lead to the older parts of the school.

Akko pulled her to an abrupt stop, then turned to face her, eyes hard. “My mind. That’s the one thing. I get to have one thing.”

Diana nodded slowly, taking great care to keep her expression unchanged.

_Even if Akko looked beautiful like this, an unwieldy storm in her eyes tumbling over red rock._

“And yet you tell me-”

“I wanted to tell you earlier,” Diana interrupted, nearly falling over herself to get the words out. “I did, and I am sorry I wasn’t able to but Akko, your emotions…”

“You don’t get to tell me what to feel.”

“And I’m _not_.” Diana reassured her, cupping a hand against her cheek. “I just – I just want to know-”

“You want to know why?” Akko asked, stepping forward, forcing Diana to step back with the movement. “Is that what you want?”

Diana felt her back bump into a wall, watched as Akko her placed hands on either side of her face, effectively caging her in. They were the same height but Diana had never felt smaller.

**Is it?**

The blonde witch nodded, not trusting herself to speak, not even noticing that Akko had asked that last question with closed lips.

Akko’s mouth curled into a sneer. “It’s because of people like-”

“ _Oh_.”

Both of them looked over to see a first-year Luna Nova student staring at them, a blush high on her cheeks. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to – um-”

Before either of them could react, the first year bowed so deeply her forehead nearly brushed the floor and rushed away, squeaking out, “I’ll just – I’ll just go then.”

After a second of bewilderment, Akko sighed, letting her arms drop. Diana briefly felt a pang of loss and immediately berated herself for thinking something so silly.

“All right, fine. We need to talk.”

The blonde looked over to see Akko staring at her, every last bit of her mask demolished. Not a trace of the smile that was ever-present on her face.

Diana nodded, gingerly poking at the mental bond to see if any of the anger levels had gone down.

They hadn’t.

She shook her hair out, straightening up. “Let’s go to my dorm, then. Hannah and Barbara are in town so we should be undisturbed until curfew.”

Neither of them noticed the stifled giggling emerging from the end of the hallway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the concept popped into my head at like 3am and i couldnt go back to sleep cus i was thinking of how to write it and so i wrote it  
> what im trying to say is that this is very self-indulgent but like why else does fanfic exist
> 
> ill try to finagle this into something with some semblance of a plot to keep your collective balls happy and very not blue


	2. Chapter 2

Since she’d started practicing, Akko could hear Diana properly for the first time since the mind link was established. More specifically, Akko could hear Diana’s _feelings_. It was weird, like listening to music by putting your hands on a speaker, feeling the bass and somehow picking out a melody at the same time.

_And she’s been hearing mine for weeks,_ Akko thought sourly, finger tapping in irritation at the idea. Then she shook her head as if to physically clear herself of her frustration. _All over and done with now, don’t need to dwell on it._

Akko felt a slight twinge in the bond and hummed wordlessly in her mind, curious to see whether Diana would pick it up. _What do I sound like to her, I wonder?_

But Diana only shifted minutely in her chair, looking up at the notes professor Finnelan had written on the board for a second before dutifully copying important points down.

She looked gorgeous like that, Akko thought privately to herself, with her hair bathing in the afternoon sunshine, a model student. Akko leaned over a little to see that – _yep_ , her notes were highlighted and labelled by helpful little post-it stickers with the topic names scrawled across in tiny, neat handwriting.

The blonde carried an air of attentiveness that always seemed to surround her – just the right amount of interest and understanding to accompany the perfect note-taking. Akko didn’t fail to notice the way Finnelan seemed to straighten up under that stare sometimes. 

Inside though… Akko stifled a laugh.

Boredom. Diana was precise and neat, so her feelings were precise and neat, and when she put her hands on that shared mental speaker it was like feeling the tick of a metronome. The most bored metronome in the world.

_I guess even she gets bored, huh?_ Akko thought to herself, trying to hide a yawn. The classroom was a little hot and Finnelan’s voice was set to one rhythm, so it felt like the easiest thing to just zone out and immerse herself in the cool blue of Diana’s mind.

Somehow it was comfortable there. Very comfortable. Akko closed her eyes and tried ‘pushing’ her mind forward a little, envisioning a ball hitting an old brick wall over and over again until the bricks collapsed to dust. She could sense more of that blue on the other side of the wall, the cold current of a river…

A brick fell, and she was home-free.

**Akko.**

She startled, snapping her eyes open. Finnelan was still droning on, the other students were either taking notes or sleeping, and Diana was carefully highlighting sections of her tiny handwriting. No one was looking at her.

“Sucy,” Akko hissed, elbowing the pale witch lightly in the side. “Did anyone say my name?”

Sucy grunted in annoyance.

“No. Stop touching me.”

Akko turned back around, resting her chin on her hands. She could have sworn…

Whatever. She shook her head lightly and closed her eyes, focusing again. Diana’s mind was turning out to be a much more interesting place than the stuffy classroom she was stuck in. 

Akko slowly made her way back, finding that parts of the brick wall had fixed itself. This time she was careful, using the mental image of formless gas instead of a ball, slipping in through the cracks. Past the boredom, the most superficial layer of feelings, past that was something like… worry, maybe?

Akko frowned. Was any of that directed at her? Since their confrontation a few weeks ago things had been more or less perfect, but if there was something Diana was hiding from her, a feeling she’d managed to tuck away…

\---

The door clicked shut behind them with an air of finality. Diana made her way to one of the couches framing the fireplace.

“I can’t help it.” Akko muttered, sighing as she did so, clenching her fists and then unclenching them. “It’s always been like this. My family’s always been like this too.”

Diana nodded. That, she understood more than anything. You couldn’t help family, after all. At least not in the beginning.

She struggled to think of what to say.

“Have you ever talked to someone about this? Your friends, any of the teachers-”

“What, and risk exposing my parents?” Akko snorted, stubbornly refusing to sit down next to Diana. They were in her empty dorm room, the journey there silent and tense. “No. It’s just a little anger. Everyone has a little anger.”

“Akko…”

Diana stared at her, eyes unreadable. After a moment, Akko sighed.

“Look.” She said, voice bitter, “I know you hate whatever _this_ is, but can’t you at least pretend like you don’t?”

Her fists clenched at her sides, eyes fluctuating between dull blood and a sunset sky.

_Breath-taking._

In the quiet, something thrummed along the bond, another one of Akko’s emotions – confusion? Before sliding away.

“Akko,” Diana said after a moment of deliberative silence, the very idea of what Akko was saying curdling like milk in her mind, “Why would you think that?”

The brunette started, off-balance. “You – what?” She replied in disbelief.

“You think I hate the bond?”

Akko blanched at the incredulity in Diana’s voice. “Why else are you constantly trying to corner me into talking about it?”

Diana’s eyebrow twitched, and her patience shattered into tiny little pieces. “Because I’m trying to understand you, and I couldn’t do that with you running away every time I tried to have a civil conversation with you!” Akko opened her mouth, but Diana rushed to speak over her, letting the last week of frustration bubble out of her lips. “So I’m sorry, truly, if any of my past actions lead you to believe otherwise, because _of course_ I don’t hate the bond. Why would I, Akko? It’s proof that we took down a missile together, that we saved the world-”

Akko stared at her, dumbfounded. “Are you saying you _like_ it?”

The other witch stopped, caught off guard by the question, and stammered out a reply. “Well – Well, I mean,”

“Diana.” Akko, cut in, impatience brought up to a low simmer, “You don’t need to pretend that-”

“Akko, I would never pretend with you. Not about something like this.” Diana said resolutely as she stood up to meet her gaze, trying to convey as much sincerity through her tone as possible. “I don’t know where you’re getting these ideas, but I promise you, they’re all wrong-”

“But why _wouldn’t_ you hate it?”

“What?”

“I’m saying – you expect me to believe that you’re satisfied, being bonded to someone like me?”

“Someone like you?” Diana repeated, confused. What was Akko insecure about? What was the one thing-

Her magic.

_Does she think the link affects my magic? Does she feel guilty?_ Her gut wrenched at the thought, because Akko’s magic was still a sore subject and was, by no means, _her_ fault. Diana still hadn’t forgotten the way she had looked, shattered and angry, all that time ago in the café.

“The bond hasn’t affected my magic so far, and I doubt it ever will.”

Akko opened her mouth to reply but Diana pressed on, “We were affected by circumstances that we could never hope to control. I thought you understood that.” She said calmly, maybe a little coolly in her haste to sound logical so that Akko (mouth pressing itself into a thin line) would stop being so unsure of herself for _once_.

“And I thought you understood the fact that your magic is _growing_ , Akko, even if at a slow pace, and that you have the potential to be the greatest witch this school has ever seen. No, really,” She said, cutting Akko off when it looked like the brunette was about to speak. Diana felt the beginnings of a blush creep up to her face but, forcing it down with willpower and ingrained etiquette lessons, said,

“Being – being bonded to you would only make the both of us stronger. That is why I could never hate this. We _saved the world_ with it Akko, how could I ever think it would weaken me?”

The fire crackled in the silence.

When she finally gathered enough courage to look up, Akko looked – embarrassed? What? The other witch’s cheeks were apple red, combining with the orange shadows of the fireplace to make a glowing sunset.

“Oh.” Akko said, off-balance. “I hadn’t even considered that.”

No amount of Friday etiquette lessons could stop the blood from rushing, full force, onto Diana’s face.

_Oh mother, I assumed the wrong things. Ohhhhhhhh mother. And I said – I said-_

She watched Akko’s face flash through a few emotions, hysterically considered the fact that they were both blushing at each other, and then silently bemoaned the way the tension in the air had immediately given room to awkwardness. Which was almost worse than the tension.

_What do I do what do I do what do I_ –

“I meant,” Akko clarified, clearing her voice a little as she cut into the spiral of Diana’s self-loathing, “I didn’t mean my magic. Though it’s um. It’s very good to know that it isn’t affecting yours.”

_Mother, if you’re out there, kill me._

The brunette soldiered on as her face slowly returned back to its normal colour, ignoring the flusteredness that was no doubt pulsing through the bond, “What I meant, was that I didn’t think you’d want to be bonded to someone with a personality as ridiculous as mine.”

_Oh._

And just like that, the tension was back.

Akko continued, voice slowly starting to dip into bitterness. “Mother knows you’ve gotten the brunt of the tantrums I have over _every_ little thing.”

_Oh_. Puzzle pieces snicked into place in Diana’s mind, a million things rearranging themselves into the correct order. She reviewed her past actions, some of the things she’d said – the disproportionateness of Akko’s defensiveness. She’d just attributed that to this – this explosive _bomb_ Akko seemed to have ticking away inside her at all times.

Akko seemed to take her silence as confirmation. In a voice so sincere it cracked the edges of something Diana hadn’t even known was in her blood,

“For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. I’ll try not to let it distract you.”

And _that_ was the crux of the problem, wasn’t it? That for Akko, her mind was the only place she let herself exist as she was. Warts and all. Exposing herself in a way she’d never done before to a person she hadn’t chosen, at a time she wasn’t ready…

Akko had said that she hadn’t felt anything from Diana’s side – so for now, at least, the bond would appear to be one-sided. That would mean that, from her point of view, Diana held all the cards.

She didn’t like the implications of that.

Diana gently circled a hand around Akko’s wrist, tentatively sitting down and pulling Akko along with her so they were on the same couch, facing each other.

She licked her lips, trying to think of the right thing to say. From what she knew of Akko, placations would sound empty, words of comfort emptier, and so her only option left was just to talk. About everything.

“You are… not the only one. Who feels the need to hide.”

Diana just needed to _balance_ it then, until the bond was more two-sided. It was only fair.

She tells Akko of her mother. Her aunts, the stares and expectations of _perfect_ that follow her everywhere she goes. The brunette, for all of her brashness and her loudness, is a good listener.

She burrows deep and swims through the well of trust that begun to dig itself the day Akko followed her to her family’s estate, and she tells Akko of her masks.

As Akko listened she felt the beginnings of her anger surge up inside her – except now, for the first time in a very _very_ long time, it wasn’t for her own sake.

“Why are you telling me this?” She asked Diana, more than a little horrified at how blind she’d been, more than a little grateful. Diana hadn’t needed to tell her anything. Diana could have walked away, full of Akko’s secrets and secure in her own.

But she hadn’t.

“It wasn’t fair to you _._ ” Diana said simply. “I knew things about you that you hadn’t offered up. And I know they might feel like ugly things, broken things, but they’re _not_. They’re just parts of who you are.”

_Beautiful, radiant things,_ Diana thinks as she sifts through the different shades of red she drowns in when she looks at Akko’s eyes, _things I hope never burn out_.

“I hoped that if you knew about me, about how ugly I am deep inside – that maybe you would know just how wonderful you are in comparison.”

A minute passed by, both witches at a loss for words.

It was like being near the sun, Diana wondered to herself. This burning intensity that never let up, every second of every hour, always a new emotion held up by another one. It all sounded so _exhausting_ to her and she marvelled at the fact that someone could stand to live like this day to day.

Next to her, Akko thought.

She thought about her parents, and about how they’d never seemed to be happy with one another, dutiful smiles or otherwise. She thought about how the nicest thing she’d ever heard her father say was _‘Be careful’_ to her mother, always more warning than concern. She thought about how she’d always had to repress this pointless childish part of her all her life because normal, functioning people didn’t break their toe bones kicking the wall after a doll had gone missing.

_Pretend, you stupid child. Or do you want to come home to an empty room?_

And then she thought about how Diana, even when Akko herself had been unresponsive and stubborn and obtuse, about how Diana had bared her soul and her heart to her solely on the reasoning of keeping things balanced. 

Would she have been as kind?

Not for the first time in her life – and most certainly not for the last if this trend was going to continue – Akko realised she was being unreasonable. Which sucked.

She exhaled softly, a tiny smile playing on her lips. 

“And just when I thought you were never wrong.”

Diana raised her eyebrows up in surprise. “What?”

Akko snorted, and leaned back against the sofa cushions, letting the tightly wound coils inside her loosen a little bit. “ _Ugly_? Nothing about you could ever be ugly, Diana. Not when you’re so undeniably _you_.”

And the way Akko said her name, like it might be synonymous to _gorgeous_ made Diana blink in surprise. For the first time since she’d had it, the bond seemed to purr in delight.

The last recesses of Akko’s spite washed away to be used later on _Diana’s fucking aunts_ as something inside her hummed with contentedness. The link?

She hadn’t known it would be this – this _intoxicating_.

“The way I see it, we only have one choice.”

“Choice?” Diana questioned, confusion evident.

“Yep,” she confirmed, unable to stop herself from grinning. Genuine this time, even if it still felt like there were too many teeth. “From this point on, we are _ourselves_ around each other. I’ll hide nothing from you – if you aren’t scared of that.”

And with that statement Diana seemed to shift back a little bit into the unbreakable witch Akko had always known her to be. “Of course not.”

“Good. Then you can’t hide anything from me.”

The blonde opened her mouth to say yes, but the words caught in her throat before she could voice them out. Akko studied her face, expression unreadable.

_I’ll have to trust her_ , Akko realised. _Mother help me, I think I already do._

“The point is that we don’t hide from each other.” Then she smiled ruefully, “With the bond in place, that’s sort of a moot point, isn’t it?”

This time Diana nodded, and the sheer relief that Akko felt across the link – that Diana felt too, the relief they both shared was enough to make them burst into laughter at the absurdity of it all. The tension slowly but surely dissipated from the air until neither of them were sure _why_ they were even laughing in the first place.

Akko huffed at the end of it and leaned sideways, slowly sinking until her head was resting on Diana’s shoulder. They both looked straight ahead, not acknowledging the contact.

“You know that I didn’t like you very much when I came here?”

A small smile made its way onto Diana’s face. “You weren’t very subtle about it.”

Akko pinched her in the side good-naturedly, making her yelp, before snuggling in deeper.

“But it was for all the wrong reasons. I respected you, because it’s basically impossible not to, but I was petty.

“I mean, you were so good at everything I wanted to be good at. Your magic, your talent, the way you resembled Chariot’s legacy more than I ever could – and I wanted to hate you, I really did… but you were just _incredible_ , Diana.”

Diana shifted, fighting back an embarrassed blush. Somehow, she felt like that would stop Akko talking and then the moment would pass and she’d never be able to get it back again.

“And everything I’ve learned about you since, including tonight – _especially_ tonight, just makes you even more so.”

“You give me too much credit.”

Akko furrowed her brows. “ _Tch_. I really don’t think I’ve given you enough.”

“Akko-”

“What I’m getting at here, is that you made me feel worthless.” Akko’s eyes fluttered shut. _Honesty, honesty. Any less is an insult._ “Worthless and angry, every single time. And the funny thing is, when I learned about what Chariot did I thought I at least had an excuse.”

_Except I didn’t_ , Akko thought, _and I hated you for how wonderful you are. Don’t you see? I’m a terrible selfish person and I don’t understand how you look past that._

But Diana only frowned, disapproving. “My dearest friend,” She murmured in a voice so gentle it kind of made Akko want to cry, “Your magic is so much more special than mine has ever been.”

“You shouldn’t have to say that.” Akko leaned further into Diana’s shoulder, falling forward so that her head was nestled in the blonde’s lap, voice slightly muffled as she continued to speak. “But I’m being unfair. I have no right to be mad at you for something as silly as this.”

“I don’t mind.” Diana replied, surprised at her own words. She mulled her feelings over.

_I really don’t. She could set my head on fire and I’d thank her for the haircut._

“Idiot Diana.” Akko said, but there was no malice flashing across the link or in the tone of her voice. “You really are too nice.”

The other witch hummed absentmindedly, feeling no need to reply as the bond thrummed in silent contentment. She slowly carded her fingers through Akko’s hair. It was unexpectedly soft, contrasting the almost wild appearance of the girl whenever she was off on another one of her weekly adventures.

Somehow, she felt unbelievably comfortable like this, the chill of her usually cold room alleviated by the warmth from the fireplace and the brunette nestled in her lap. Slowly and methodically, she twisted the brown strands into little braids. 

It felt like hours before Akko spoke up again, voice so relaxed it almost sounded like she was slurring, “Didja really mean that?”

Diana thought back to their conversation and came up blank. “Mean what?”

“Earlier. What y’said about my magic.”

She sniffed, taking care to tuck her embarrassment away. “Lying is for commoners and thieves, Akko, and I am neither.”

When she got no response she sneaked a look at the other, feeling elation bubble to the tips of her toes when she noticed the wide, genuine smile.

Akko shifted her head so her face was turned towards Diana’s navel, eyes closed shut. Diana looked down at her, tracing every little vein on those eyelids, noting how her breathing slowly evened out until they’d turned into tiny snores.

Later on, Diana wouldn’t be quite sure when she’d fallen asleep too. Only that she’d stared getting drowsy around the time she’d counted each individual, almost invisible freckle scattered across the rise of Akko’s cheekbones (there were around twenty-eight, but she couldn’t be too sure, what with half of Akko’s face smushed into her lap like that).

\---

After that they’d been able to talk to each other a little easier, pieces of themselves slowly slotting back into place until it was like the whole thing had never happened. Diana tactfully didn’t bring the conversation up, gently shaking her awake the next morning (because _somehow_ they’d slept through the entire afternoon and night) so she could go back to her dorm to change in time for class. Thankfully, Lotte and Sucy were still asleep when she’d gotten back. They’d never asked her about her absence the night before so they probably hadn’t even noticed she’d been missing, most likely assuming she’d gone on another one of her infamous ‘magic training’ sessions.

With all of the panic of Diana finding out about just how much of a screw up Akko was, she’d never really found the time to mourn the loss of their friendship. But now that they were talking to each other (normally!) again, Akko could safely say that she’d _missed_ talking to Diana, no matter how small their talk was. Missed her with this fierceness she hadn’t even been aware of until now – it was like warming her cold hands by the fire when she listened to Diana laugh, or when she smiled that small smile that softened her face. Even the slight reprimands about her grades didn’t bother her as much.

Privately, Akko wondered if Diana had missed her too.

Then again, exams were coming up and the blonde had been studying nonstop for days, so probably not.

**Akko**.

There it was again! Akko’s frown deepened as she discreetly surveyed the classroom, trying to see if anyone had hissed her name out. She gave up after the third once-over, resting her head back into the nook of her arms.

Delving into the bond was… _interesting_ , to say the least. Once, in the shade of a tree during a simultaneous free period, Akko had asked her how she knew it was there.

“Your emotions, Akko. They are, like the rest of you, very loud.” Diana had said, closing her book with the exasperation of someone who knew she’d never get around to studying because her friend _wouldn’t stop bothering her_.

Akko only laughed at the slight twinge of annoyance that travelled across the link.

“How did you know they weren’t yours?”

“Because I wouldn’t be _that_ angry over missing dessert.”

“It was chocolate cake day! We only get that once a week, anybody would be – Diana are you _laughing_ at me?”

And after, when she was tucked away in bed, Akko concentrated, trying to see if she could feel Diana even over this distance. It took her the better part of half an hour, and a lot of concentration – but sure enough, in the base of her mind, she could feel a numbness that she instinctively understood as sleep. So, Diana was sleeping then.

Akko smiled lightly, allowing the rhythmic thumps of that numbness to lull her to unconsciousness.

**Akko**.

She jerked upright in her seat, finally recognizing the voice. She’d recognize that voice _anywhere_ , even if it was echo-ey and breathy and really weird-sounding. “Diana?”

“Akko?” Diana replied, a touch of surprise in her voice. There was the prettiest dust of pink across her cheeks, and it really was unfair, Akko thought, how attractive she looked sometimes.

To Diana’s left, Hannah and Barbara were watching them with raised eyebrows.

“Were you just-”

“All right, everyone listen up closely because I will not be repeating myself.” Professor Finnelan announced, effectively cutting Akko off. Diana mouthed _‘later’_ at her before dutifully turning around.

“Your end-of-the-year assignments are going to be about _joint magic_. Given the fact that we just covered joint magic in the last topic, I don’t think I’ll have to explain what it is.” A murmur of assent rippled through the class. Akko tried very, _very_ hard to blend into her desk.

“You’re all going to be working in pairs for this assignment. You do _not-_ ” Professor Finnelan raised her voice, eyeing the few girls in the back who’d started chattering excitedly, “Get to pick who you do this assignment with. But, neither will I.”

Another ripple of conversation went through the class, each riddled with obvious confusion. Akko wondered if this was how sitcom actors felt all the time.

Professor Finnelan turned toward the whiteboard, and started to draw something. Runes? “If you recall, joint magic is very dependent, not on magical skill and talent itself – though that does come in handy – but on magical compatibility. No matter their skill, if two witches have incompatible magic, it may take them a great amount of effort to perform the simplest joint magic spell. So!”

Professor Finnelan stepped away from the board to reveal a large circle of runes, connected at the top and at the bottom by two smaller circles, a weird-looking jagged rune inside each. “Your magic will choose your partners for you.”

As soon as she had finished her sentence, a piece of paper poofed itself into existence on Akko’s desk. She reared back a little, poking at the thing with the eraser end of her pencil. It moved slightly, but it didn’t explode into a fiery ball of evil.

“ _Sucy_ ,” she whispered, “ _What’s this?_ ”

Sucy looked down at her own piece of paper, expression dead serious. “I’m not sure Akko, but it might be paper.”

Just before Akko could strangle her (it wouldn’t be _hard_ , the pale witch was ridiculously small), professor Finnelan caught their attention again. “I want you to write your names down on the paper that’s appeared in front of you, and imbue your magic into it.”

A student in the back immediately protested, “But professor! Imbuing magic into non-magical things is third-year level work!”

Professor Finnelan nodded. “I have taken this into account, of course. Headmistress Holbrooke was kind enough to charm each paper you see on your desk there to make it a little easier on all of you.”

Somehow, Akko could feel Finnelan’s gaze on her as she said this. “It will take no effort at all. Just press the tip of your wand to your paper, and the results will speak for themselves. Now, don’t waste a second! When you’re finished, give your papers to me.”

Conversation rose back up to a dim roar as the students, now excited, followed suit. Akko watched in amazement as Lotte’s paper glowed a soft light green. The amazement quickly turned to fear as mushrooms started popping up on Sucy’s paper in tens.

“Lotte!” She wailed, scooching backwards from unnaturally sharp teeth, “Save me!”

The ginger only sighed, tugging gently on Sucy’s sleeve. “Come on Sucy. We have to give this to the professor.”

“ _Would you like a mushroom, dear Akko?”_

“Lotteeee!”

With a final tug – Lotte was surprisingly buff – the witch was pulled into the aisle, herded along by all of the other students headed toward Finnelan’s table.

The minute they were gone, Akko looked down at her paper with a sigh. She hadn’t even tried with hers yet, already sure of the outcome. No glow, no mushrooms, nothing to show for her end of the year assignment.

She closed her eyes and, with great trepidation, touched the end of her wand to her paper. Hesitantly, she slid one eye open.

Nothing.

Gritting her teeth, she lifted her wand and touched the paper again. Still nothing.

Right. This was expected of course – she was getting along fine with her magic, but it was a slow and gradual process and apparently not even a charm from the headmistress herself could get her past the final few steps.

But, Akko thought determinedly, she had to try! She had to try, so she could be just like –

Hm.

Akko closed her eyes to the feeling of anger again, the almost familiar comfort of rage sweeping through her. Just like Chariot? Maybe once. But now, now she wanted… what did she want?

_I want to be able to fly a broom properly for starters._ Akko thought, eyes dulling. _I want to be able to know what it’s like to not have my magic fail me, just once_ -

The paper in front of her started to bleed red, cutting her thoughts off. Akko watched in slight bemusement as the colour spilled across the white surface, waves of it coming off of her wand. A red so deep it was almost black, the same red she’d seen in all of Croix’s cubes, the same red she saw whenever she used Shiny Rod.

_My anger_ , she thought numbly. A small smile played on her lips, unbidden. Always her anger.

There was the smallest tug on the base of her brain, startling her enough that she looked up – straight into Diana’s eyes, wading into the icy blue of her irises.

“Akko.”

She’d never gotten over how sinful the way Diana made her name sound, but she steeled herself, looking defiantly up at expectant eyes. “Diana.”

“Here?” The blonde murmured, questioning. “In front of so many others?”

The instant surge of rage at the words made Akko’s face go blank with the effort of not curling her lips into sneer. It was only after Diana blinked in surprise did Akko take stock of those words, what they really meant.

_Right. The arrangement. Fuck_.

Something they’d agreed on, two days after they’d confronted each other…

“Hehe, of course not!” Akko chirped, eyes bright enough to cover anything underneath. “Didn’t know what you meant for a second there.”

Diana’s expression remained impassive but the concern was tangible enough to thrum across the bond. Akko tugged on it, wrapped herself up in it, reminded herself that Diana cared (sincerely, truly cared).

The blonde tilted her head slightly. “Later, then?”

“If you’re up to-”

“Akko!” Amanda called out from where she was situated next to Finnelan’s desk. “Hurry up, I wanna get to the field!”

Akko huffed out a small snort, replying with an “Okay!”

Right before she left her seat to head to the back of the line she brushed Diana’s hand against hers, carefully avoiding her eyes. “Later,” she continued from where she’d left off. “Only if you’re up to it.”

**Always.**

Akko widened her eyes at the voice that reverberated in her head but by the time she’d looked back at Diana the blonde was seated again, talking to Hannah and Barbara.

At her seat, Diana fidgeted, trying to focus solely on her notes. When she looked up to try and see if Akko was looking at her, she was met only with the twin stares of her roommates. Confused, open-mouthed stares.

“…Yes?”

“What was-”

“ _Later_?” Hannah whisper-shouted, “What do you mean _later_? Are you guys-”

“ _Hannah_.” Barbara hissed, as Diana blinked, growing increasingly bewildered by their behaviour. “ _Tact_.”

“Are you meeting up with Akko later?” Hannah asked instead of replying, boring holes into the side of Diana’s head. Barbara winced at the bluntness, but listened attentively for her reply all the same.

Diana frowned. “Yes, I am.”

Barbara raised an eyebrow. “So, all those nights you aren’t in our room-”

“Is it because you’re always with Akko?”

Diana blanched. They’d noticed? Their… the arrangement she and Akko had, it was beneficial for the both of them but it was better that no one could see, that no one knew – she’d done her best to leave the room quietly but she’d messed up somewhere, judging by the way her roommates were looking at her.

They must have read the surprise because a knowing glint appeared in both of their eyes. Diana was vaguely reminded of circling sharks.

“Well, well, well. And from our head student as well!” Hannah crowed, smile growing ever wider. “Come on, give us details, what do you guys do?”

“ _Hannah_ I’m sure we can all-”

“Training.” Diana cut them off firmly. It was an excuse she and Akko had come up with. The most believable one too, considering the marks left, the destruction. “We train together. She wants help with her magic and I could never deny a request as simple as that.”

Hannah and Barbara sat back at the same time, dumfounded. “Training.” Hannah mouthed at Barbara.

Diana looked at the both of them, growing a little tired of how out-of-the-loop she felt. “Yes? What about it?”

“ _Training_. That was the _gayest thing I’ve ever seen, and she says_ mmf!”

“Right! Training, of course.” Barbara said cheerfully as she clapped her hand over Hannah’s mouth. “Sorry for being so nosy.”

Diana watched them wearily. “It’s no trouble of course.” She could hear them conversing in hushed whispers to her side but she ignored them for the time being, choosing instead to try to copy the runes on the blackboard down onto her notebook.

She looked up to see Akko give her paper – dark red, she noted, the way her eyes looked when she was angry and beautiful – to Professor Finnelan. The professor took a second to examine it, but otherwise dropped it into the bucket with everyone else’s paper.

“All right!” Finnelan clapped her hands together. “That’s everyone. You’re free to leave the classroom now, but keep an eye out for the announcements on the bulletin boards! Your pairs will be put up there by tomorrow morning. I want you sitting next to your partner in the next class, because that’s when we’ll start practicing joint magic.”

No sooner had the last words come out of her mouth did Amanda immediately race out of the back doors of the classroom, Akko right on her heels.

“Last one to the field has to pay for lunch!”

Finnelan frowned as she watched them but only sighed, used to their antics. It was something most of the teachers had learned to ignore by now. Behind her, the remainders of the red team and the blue team filed out at a much more reasonable pace.

“Oh, Diana!” Diana paused in collecting her books, looking up at Finnelan.

“Yes professor?”

“Would you mind staying behind for a little while? A new shipment of scrolls from the dragon age came in and I was wondering if…”

She huffed inwardly but nodded, waving her roommates away. “Of course, professor.”

\---

It happened during lunch. Or at least, during _her_ lunch since everyone else had started earlier. She’d been eating in the cafeteria as everyone chatted around her, lucky enough to catch the tail end of one of Hannah and Barbara’s infamous ‘gossip sessions’ – when the faint sensation of a sudden sharp pain flew up her left arm, reaching her elbow and racing back down to her wrist. It only lasted the barest few seconds but she jerked her hand back all the same.

“Diana?” Mary, one of Barbara’s friends, turned to look at her, concern lacing her words. “Are you okay?”

Diana twitched a few of her fingers, trying to shake off the stares that were slowly gravitating toward her. “I am all right. It must have been-”

And then she cut herself off with a gasp, immediately standing up because judging by the _irritation_ and the _anger_ rolling across her mind in waves, everything was, in fact, not all right.

She was barely aware of excusing herself from the table, speed walking as fast as she could across the cafeteria without breaking into a flat-out run, and then _actually_ breaking into a flat-out run the minute her shoes were touching grass.

On some level, she’d always felt Akko’s irritation, her frustration, but never – not of this magnitude, like it was amplified a million to one, as if Akko was standing right next to her instead a good few metres away. What had changed? What was different about-

**Fuck! Fuck, _fuck,_ every _time_ , does it always have to be-**

She recoiled, but only for a second before calling out in her own mind –

**Akko? Akko!**

Diana turned right, instinctively knowing where the brunette would be. Her feet thudded out the rhythm of her heartbeat, loud and roaring in her ears.

**Diana?**

**Akko, where are you?**

**How are you doing this?!**

**Never mind that, tell me where you are!**

A moment of silence. And then-

**_Stay away_ ** **.**

A lesser woman might have stopped at the accompanying feeling of revulsion.

A lesser woman wouldn’t have known that the revulsion was directed inwards and not outwards, not at Diana, Akko’s emotions seemed to say, never at Diana because we know now that Diana is safe and near, look here she comes-

Here she comes, because Diana had never, not once in her life, been the _lesser woman_.

She spotted her on the field, slightly curled in on herself as Amanda stood over her. “Akko!”

“ _Cavendish?_ ” Amanda said, bewildered. “What are you doing here?”

Before she could come up with an excuse, Akko cut in. Intentionally, to stop the line of questioning or just to be obtuse she wasn’t sure.

“Diana.” Akko gritted out, and even with her face twisted into the brightest smile Diana had ever seen (overcompensating, she tutted to herself), her voice was as rough as gravel. “What a pleasant surprise.”

“Right.” Diana met her glare coolly, looking the brunette up and down before zeroing in on the awkward way she was clutching at her left arm – the same area she’d felt those phantom tingles not so long ago. “I’m taking you to the infirmary.”

She laughed, waving her off with her good arm. “There’s no need for that, I don’t want to cause any trouble!”

“ _Akko_. Your arm is clearly fractured, if not broken. You need medical attention.”

“Diana, I told you it’s-”

“You’re _not_ fine, you’re injured.”

The smile faltered a little bit. “And how would you know?”

“Because I have two functional eyes and I’m not in the habit of under-utilizing them.”

“Amanda! Is Akko okay, that looked like a really nasty fall!”

Neither of them looked up to see Lotte and Jasminka approaching them, Sucy and Constanze not far behind, but Amanda did. Her eyes looked like they were stuck in a semi-permanent imitation of an owl with how high her eyebrows were raised.

“Diana?” Lotte intoned questioningly. “When did she get here?”

Amanda spread her hands out helplessly and half-shrugged. “I don’t know. Akko fell sort of awkwardly and then Diana was just… there.”

She didn’t know what to think of it. There had been a lapse in Akko’s magic again, but they were much further above the ground than usual – a good fifteen feet, maybe higher – when all of a sudden Akko’s broom had simply _stopped_. Amanda had raced after her but her flying skills could only do so much in a race against gravity.

For a split second it had looked like Akko’s arm might be hurting but the brunette had waved her off so casually she hadn’t thought anything of it – until.

_Did Diana say broken?_ Amanda frowned to herself. But Akko had shown no signs! She knew the pain of a broken arm and – and honestly this entire interaction was confusing, what with Akko, even as she smiled, almost snapping at the blonde’s line of questioning, something the cheerful dunce would normally never do.

How did Diana even know to come here?

Sucy showed up beside them, eyelids raised a little above their usual droopy state. “Diana?”

Amanda’s frown deepened. “Like I said, I don’t know why-”

“Amanda.” Diana said, and holy shit that was the voice she used on all the misbehaving students it sucked to be on the receiving end of it, “Did Akko fall on her left arm?”

She still hadn’t turned away from Akko. The two of them looked like they were trying to glare each other to death – if glare was even the right word for it. Diana’s eyes were cold, her voice colder, and Akko’s teeth were bared in what was starting to look more and more like a vicious snarl.

“Um-” And usually she’d tell the truth of course, but right now, right now Akko suddenly looked terrifying. Would telling Diana count as snitching? As siding against her?

_Quick!_ She panicked, sending her two remaining brain cells into overdrive, _think for me please, just this once just for today, I never ask you to do anything else!_

“Amanda, please. If she did then she might need medical attention.”

“Maybe!” She blurted out, cursing herself. Neutral ground. No one blasted neutral ground, right? Switzerland was still standing, after all. “I’m not sure, I didn’t get a clear – a good view of her falling. Too far away for that.” Akko’s smile ( _smile?_ ) twitched almost imperceptibly.

“See? I’m fine, told you. I don’t need the infirmary.”

Diana’s mouth pressed itself into a tight line. “I really don’t understand why you’re being so stubborn about this.”

“Akko?” Lotte asked tentatively, like she could sense the atmosphere. Both of them turned to look at her, stares just as intense, and Amanda prayed feverishly for the ginger’s wellbeing.

“You should go, even if you don’t feel any pain right now. You fell from really high and it might be serious, even if it doesn’t feel like it at the moment.”

Diana nodded approvingly, turning to shift her gaze back down to Akko again. She held out a hand.

“Listen to her. Let’s go.” This time, her voice brooked no argument.

Akko let out a laugh that sounded more pissed off than resigned, and clasped the offered hand. “Guess I have no choice then.” When she stood up she turned to eye them, the red in her irises unerringly vibrant, before turning away again. “ _Ahh_ it’s so sweet that you guys care about me but you shouldn’t worry so much! I’ll go to the nurse and she’ll say I’m fine, you’ll see.”

She started to walk away, the outline of her back ramrod straight as she said – with none of the earlier friendliness in her voice, “Come on, Diana.”

Diana simply nodded at them, speed walking a little to catch up to Akko and then slowing down to match her pace.

The minute they were out of sight Amanda let out an exhale she hadn’t known she was holding. Beside her, Lotte furrowed her brows.

“I wasn’t the only one who thought that was weird right?” The American asked, hands flapping in an inane attempt to exorcise her pent-up energy. “I mean, did Diana seem extra pissy today or?”

“I didn’t think she was that different.” Lotte replied, “But Akko certainly did.”

“They looked like they were about to kill each other! Jasminka you were close, you saw it right?”

Jasminka smiled dreamily and munched on a cookie instead of responding. The American internally sweatdropped.

“Maybe Diana was really worried,” Lotte interjected. “That’s just how she is when she worries.”

“And Akko-” Amanda wondered aloud, “When she’s in pain, does she usually look like she’s about to commit homicide?”

Because broken arm or not, there was something _wrong_ about that smile, altogether weird, an off feeling Amanda couldn’t put her finger on.

Sucy snorted, managing to make an exhale sound like a deadpan. “No. She’s usually just annoying.”

“That – That wasn’t _annoying_.” And then Amanda narrowed her eyes in thought, voicing the one thing she couldn’t figure out. “How did Diana even know to come here anyway?”

Lotte looked at her, surprised. “You mean you didn’t call her over?”

“And risk getting into trouble with the school’s princess? No, of course not.” She turned to look at their disappearing figures, Akko just a few steps ahead of the blonde. “She didn’t even look surprised when she saw Akko…”

“Maybe she saw her fall?”

Maybe. But she wasn’t anywhere near when Akko had fallen, not that Amanda could remember.

“She probably did, and since it’s Akko she rushed over here as soon as she could.” Sucy interjected. _Since it’s Akko?_ Then she smiled, and Amanda was really starting to hate the look of those sharp teeth. “As for how worried she was…well. You all know my theory.”

Two brain cells went into overdrive again, combing recent memories, recent interactions – _oh_. The way Lotte’s face went up in flames pretty much confirmed it.

“How has Akko never strangled you before?”

The ginger sighed and adjusted her glasses. “Apparently, it’s grounds for an expulsion.”

\---

“Of all the stupid, irresponsible things-”

“Just because you have a key to everything I’m feeling doesn’t mean you get to act on those feelings, _Cavendish_!” Akko spat the name out like it was poison, sitting on an infirmary bed. It was oddly déjà vu-ish, what with the nurse being out for the meantime, Diana standing and being bombarded with this infinite storm of emotion. “Is my mind not enough? I share every part of myself with you but it’s _my_ body, we agreed on that-”

“I would do this for you even if I wasn’t linked to your feelings, you fool! Akko, I know you’re intelligent so _why_ would you try to hide injuries like these? In what way do you benefit?” Diana paused as she felt the other’s anger, sudden and sharp, flash across her mind. “Is it _pride_?”

Akko’s nostrils flared as she inhaled deeply, back tensing. “I don’t need to tell you anything.”

“If it concerns your safety-”

“ _Diana_.” And this time the inferno in those eyes was much, much colder. “How is this any worse than the arrangement?”

The blonde pressed her lips together. “You’ve never broken an arm before.”

“You don’t even know it’s broken.”

“Fractured then. Bruised, damaged, an _injury_ is an _injury_ and you shouldn’t be stupid about them.”

Akko sat back then, any trace of her mask long gone. “Ah, there she is. Perfect, golden girl Diana. Would you like to be the one to heal me? I know you think you’re better than the nurse.”

Diana’s breath hitched with the words, knowing that if she looked in a mirror her pupils would be blown wide. “Don’t say that.”

“Why not?” Akko crooned, sending electricity coursing through the bond – or was that her, or was it both of them, “It’s what you want to be right? It’s what you want to be seen as?”

“ _Akko_ ,” Diana croaked out, “ _Not now_.”

Right on time too, as the nurse walked in. Diana didn’t know when she’d gotten so close to the brunette but it suddenly felt important to take a few steps back, take stock of what she was feeling. Akko stayed in place – had to really, what with being seated on the bed – but she straightened up a little before plastering on a smile so blinding it was a wonder the nurse could look at her without squinting.

“You again!” The nurse exclaimed not unkindly, a laugh underlying her words. “Trying to become a regular now, aren’t we?”

Akko giggled and scrubbed at the back of her neck with her good arm. “It’s a habit.”

The nurse tutted before turning to Diana. “And Ms Cavendish, how nice of you to accompany her.”

Diana smiled. It didn’t shine, not like Akko’s, but it served its purpose just as well. “I was afraid she wouldn’t come had I not forced her.”

The nurse eyed Akko disapprovingly. “You need to listen to Ms Cavendish more. Better an injection today than an amputation tomorrow, that’s what my mother used to say.” She patted at her scrubs absentmindedly before frowning. “Darn, I think my wand’s in my desk. If it’s not serious, can I leave you ladies here for a minute?”

Before Diana could reply with a scathing comment about the absolute incompetence of the nurse, Akko nodded, throwing in a sunny “Sure!” for good measure.

As soon as the nurse was out of earshot, her smile dropped. It never ceased to amaze Diana how quickly the red frosted over.

“Tonight.”

Diana blinked, before collecting herself. There was no doubt as to what Akko meant. More than trepidation she felt relief, anticipation, because their unfinished argument had left her feeling too keyed-up and jittery to leave it as it was.

She nodded curtly, pushing all of her exasperation at Akko’s refusal to admit to her injury through the bond as she did so.

They stared at each other for a second, two, before Diana turned tail and left the clinic.

\---

Akko reflected on her relationship with Diana.

It was new, _such_ a new thing, an unprecedented event that no one had ever experienced before. She couldn’t search _how to deal with being psychically connected to your best friend_ (she’d tried – only some sham clickbaity articles about soulmates). And it was new, not only for them but for everyne else in the world.

It was a tremulous thing too. Stable, but unstable the way a cookie cutter house built on a solid foundation might be. Easy to fragment, but permanent.

The confrontation, the confrontation and – the _arrangement_ had fixed a lot of things, but a lot of the time nothing was perfect, set in stone. Just because they respected each other, loved each other, didn’t mean they’d be able to hold that up during every argument. Like just now for example – Diana _knew_ Akko didn’t like to go to the infirmary whenever she could help it, and she hadn’t been quite brave enough to explain _why_ (not… not just yet), so why couldn’t the blonde simply take her for her word and leave it at that? Why did it always have to be some song and dance about what was basically just a little bruise?

Or a fracture but _whatever_ , it had only taken the smallest hint of a second for the nurse to wave on a cast.

The point was that the dynamic they had in their relationship was, truth be told, a little weird. Akko thought about that sometimes during their meet-ups – almost nightly, now, with how much tension the upcoming exams were filling them with.

They were themselves around each other, but it wasn’t this soft, fluttery thing she’d read about in Lotte’s night fall books. After they’d talked it out it had settled almost immediately into this high-speed octane intensity that never let up, day in and day out. And all those feelings, the way they sometimes openly used each other as tools to alleviate stress – would there ever be a limit?

Akko smiled to herself, knowing it wouldn’t look quite right to anyone watching. The bond resonated within her, almost vibrating with energy, and she knew somewhere that Diana’s eyes were flashing her cold blue.

A limit. _As_ if. They’d eat each other _alive_ , and Akko would savour every moment of it.

The rest of the day was an unimportant blur. When she’d finally left the infirmary, Akko had barely been able to register the concern her friends showed at the sight of the cast wrapped around her arm or the rest of her classes – none of them with Diana, thank _god_ because she didn’t think she’d be able to handle being around her when the bond was crackling with this much tension.

Hour by hour, little by little, the day wasted away. She was sitting in her room and pacing – as much as she could in the limited space she had anyway – when, all of a sudden, it was time. Ten thirty, half an hour past curfew. Fortunately, Lotte and Sucy were already asleep so she didn’t have to put up the usual string of excuses as she left.

She made her way to one of the empty classrooms in the abandoned wing, taking time to think about what today had revealed about the bond. Talking over distances – that was new, but she’d had her suspicions in Finnelan’s class.

Diana could also, apparently, feel _pain_ through the bond as well.

That was… potentially troubling.

And if the idea of having to share her feelings was still a bit of an awkward idea sometimes, the idea that what she _felt_ , what she put her body through, that she had no privacy in the most superficial sense of the word? She felt the beginnings of one of her infamous childish tantrums blow up before she immediately quelled it.

_It’s Diana though_ , a traitorous part of her brain whispered. _You trust her_.

Akko stared straight ahead into nothing. _Maybe, maybe._

_But does she trust me?_

She walked into the classroom and was unsurprised to find Diana already seated at one of the front row seats.

“You’re late.” The blonde observed, before sliding her eyes to Akko’s left arm, the light blue cast that encircled it. “Fractured?”

“Yeah.”

Bond or no bond, the disapproval was clear. “So I was right. You were being irresponsible.”

“You don’t know everything, Diana.”

“Then _help me to_.” She snapped, standing up abruptly in an uncharacteristic display of impatience. Akko’s throat clicked as she swallowed. “I swear, it’s like you’re trying your best to make things difficult for the both-”

“No.”

And this time, Akko stood firm, her voice unyielding as the bond flared to life and all of the tension from before came flooding in. Both of them stayed perfectly still for a few seconds, letting the air around them thicken into something almost oppressively humid.

“No.” Akko repeated in the voice that Diana could never refuse because of how much of that twisted, beautiful anger it contained, “First, we fight.”

And if Diana had any protests about injuring Akko’s _fractured_ arm further, they were immediately dispelled – alongside a mouthful of air as a fist was driven straight into her stomach.

\---

BONUS SCENE:

[Takes place after the confrontation.]

[aka the reason Akko didn’t have to walk of shame the morning after]

“Oh my god the fucking _lesbos_.”

“Called it. I called it, didn’t I?” Barbara cackled, taking a picture with a phone she’d hidden away from the staff. “No one gets _that_ fixated on someone unless there’s something else going on.”

“ _I’m going to go help Akko_.” Hannah said in a falsetto, puffing out her chest and exaggerating the serious expression on her face. “ _It’s not because I like her or anything it’s just what I do_.”

Barbara sighed, wiping away an imaginary tear. “And I thought she didn’t have it in her. I’m so proud.”

Hannah started at the words, frowning. “Wait.” Hannah said, “Wait, this doesn’t mean they’re dating though.”

The other witch deadpanned a look at her. “Are you kidding me? _Look at how they’re_ -”

“So? You and I slept like that before _we_ started dating!”

Barbara scoffed, turning her nose up. “Doesn’t mean anything, we were basically dating since we were five.”

“Not officially!” Hannah hissed back. “This only proves one thing, that-”

“That you have to pay up fool,” Barbara jeered, holding out a hand. “Deny it all you want, they’re dating, I called it first, and you owe me a twenty.”

“I’m not paying you squat ‘til we get confirmation.”

“Confirmation, schmonfirmation, you weren’t nearly this picky about details when-”

“What the fuck?”

They both stiffened, turning to look at the sleeping figures on the couch. A single red eye was open, staring accusatorily at them. It took a second for the bleariness to clear from the gaze, another second for unfamiliar anger to cloud it.

“Get out.”

Hannah sputtered, taken aback. “What?”

“Get out, _now_.”

Barbara scoffed, putting a steady hand on Hannah’s shoulder. “You can’t order us around in _our room_ , commoner. Who do you think-”

“Did you know,” The brunette thundered quietly, red eyes sharpening with each word, “That my very good friend Constanze has access to the observation orbs in the library? Every single one.” Barbara stiffened for a fraction of a second but Akko caught the reaction and doubled down gleefully.

“Including the west wing.”

At her side, Hannah hissed like a viper. “You wouldn’t _dare_.”

“Would you like to bet on it?”

Diana shifted slightly, blissfully unaware of the sudden spike of anxiety that echoed around the room. When she stayed asleep, Akko turned her eyes back to them.

Or at least, back to the dust cloud shapes they’d left mid-air. She snorted softly, taking care not to disturb Diana as she burrowed further into her thighs. _Nothing will ever come close to this,_ Akko thought drowsily, silently mourning the fact that all of the pillows she’d ever use after today would feel like cheap polyester in comparison.

…

“Was Akko kind of…”

“Hot? Yeah.”

Barbara smacked her across the arm none-too-gently. “You know what I mean.”

“Hot, scary, those two go hand in hand. Case in point, you.”

“Maybe Diana’s rubbing off on her too much.”

The crickets chirped as they thought. Hannah shifted a little closer to Barbara, pillowing her head on Barbara’s chest and greedily basking in their shared body heat. Barbara huffed, her girlfriend’s head rising and falling with the movement. 

“I hate camping.”

“There’s nowhere else to sleep.”

“There’s dirt _everywhere_.”

“Didn’t seem to bother you as much when we were-”

“Good night, Hannah.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> diana is now not as enthusiastic about akko rearranging her guts
> 
> okay, few notes; 
> 
> characterization shakier than got s8, my bad, im working on it, fun fact - i rewrote the 'confrontation' scene four times and am still pretty pissed at how it turned out
> 
> for those of you confused at the ending falcon punch, it will all be explained in the next chapter! probably! 
> 
> thank you for reading, stay safe, and don't forget to include lots of fibre in your diet!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ATTENTION: Timeline-wise, basically this entire chapter happens before the classroom scene/injured arm in the second chapter. Little confusing but please bear with me.

**_Two weeks ago_ **

It was weird, being able to throw temper tantrums around someone without being scolded or treated like some kind of feral monster. But no matter how childish she got, Diana did neither, simply standing back and approaching when the bond informed her that Akko had gotten most of it out of her system.

It was a while before Akko realised she never got the chance to extend the same courtesy toward her. 

It wasn’t that Diana was going out of her way to pretend perfection around Akko the way she might have done with the teachers and the rest of her friends. It was just that a lot of the time it was like she was suppressing parts of herself. Surprise, sadness, ambition, all of that bled away into the stoic line of her mouth when she was on the defensive. Always calm and collected, that was what Diana was, even when she was observing some of Akko’s more physical fits of anger.

Like now, for example.

Akko snarled as she kicked at a wall, a portion of it now free of the ivy that was crawling up the rest of its surface. Today was a _day_. A bad one, following another bad one.

And once again, all because of her magic. It felt like it was actively trying to kill her at this point with how much it backfired, the bitter tang of failure sticking uncomfortably to her skin.

“You’re defacing school property.”

Akko barely looked up at the voice, fully aware of the sound of disapproval humming insistently in her mind. Not at what she was doing, but what she was doing it _to_.

“You have a stick up your ass.”

Diana glared at her. “Excuse me?”

“That’s what we’re doing, right?” Akko snarked, refusing to meet her gaze. “Stating the obvious?”

Indignation and something a little like concern pulsed across the bond and Akko sighed. It had been about a week since they’d talked it out, and things had settled but they’d settled in the wrong way, emotions spiking higher rather than down. It was especially worse when they were alone together somehow, as if the presence of other people diluted the gas cloud of emotions that always suffocated the both of them, ready and waiting for a spark. 

Like right now. The irritation she’d felt when she’d failed Ursula’s practical magic test had been set on a back burner, but being near Diana was like having all of it just tugged _up_ and out of her.

The effect went both ways though, and if Diana could control herself not to lash out then Akko could damn well do the same. 

She sighed, setting her foot solidly down on the ground and leaning back against the wall. “Sorry.”

Diana raised an eyebrow in mild surprise but nodded, expression questioning.

“What happened?”

“We had to do the transformation spell today for Ursula’s class.” If Diana noted the lack of an honorific or a ‘professor,’ she didn’t comment. “I couldn’t get my magic to work.”

“You’ve transformed many times before.”

“Only half. Only partly.” Akko contemplated punching the wall again but held back, if only because her knuckles were starting to ache something awful. “She didn’t consider anything less than a full.”

“Even with your…” Diana hesitated, but they both knew what she was thinking. “history together?”

The other witch exhaled slowly. “She figured I’d had enough practice.”

There was a bit of silence for a while, before Diana spoke up again, her voice a touch softer. “Are you still angry at her?”

Akko didn’t hesitate before spitting out an, “Always. _Always_ , her and her rotten lies.” It was petty, obviously, because Ursula hadn’t known – but the Kagaris were not rational people and Akko wasn’t one for breaking family tradition. “But not this time. This time it’s just my fault.”

Diana regarded her evenly for a minute, eyes unreadable.

“What if I tutored you?”

Akko raised an eyebrow. “I don’t need your pity, Diana.” There was no malice in her words, despite their nature. Just a half-hearted refusal. Diana ignored the remark, if only because the bond between them ensured that Akko knew pity was the last thing on her mind. 

“It’s only practical, seeing as how we spend most of our free time together. One lesson now and then won’t change anything.”

Akko hummed.

“It would depend.”

“On?”

“Are you going to be perfect, head of the school Diana in all our lessons too?”

Diana held back her flinch but it was a near thing. _She’s just angry,_ she reminded herself, _her words turn to fire when she’s angry._

But that didn’t stop her from curling her fingers, digging her nails into her palm.

“Because I don’t want to spend time with that Diana.” Akko said, facing her full on. “I want to be taught by the Diana who promised she’d start being herself around me.”

“I _am_ myself around you!”

“Hypocrite,” Akko snarled, her shoulders tensing under the weight of that infinite anger. “We said we wouldn’t put up pretences when we were with each other, remember?”

That night, in Diana’s dorm. _“You can’t hide anything from me_. _”_

Belatedly, Akko realised she’d never gotten an answering _yes_ out of Diana. She’d decided then that she’d just have to trust her – but it had been a week since they’d talked and patience wasn’t one of Akko’s stunning traits.

Did Diana – did she not trust Akko? Was it because of what she’d seen of her so far, the twistedness of her true personality?

Suddenly enraged (and it was horrible of her to cherish the unsure stance Diana shifted into but she did), she pounded at her chest, once, twice, like she was trying to force her heart into submission, and snarked fiercely. 

****

“What are you so afraid of me seeing, Diana? I mean, look at me now! Look at how much of a monster I am, at how shitty I am as a person – how could you ever think you’re worse than this?”

Inwardly, Diana chanted a _no no no_ , because how could Akko ever think her anger, the rawest, deepest parts of her _weren’t_ beautiful, but she didn’t say any of it out loud because suddenly she was terrified. Of what Akko was saying, of what she meant.

_One flaw_ , her aunt had whispered to her, a warning on the night of Earl Hanbridge’s ball, _and they’ll eat you alive._

“You’re not – that’s not-”

And then she stopped because stuttering was a _flaw_.

It was only at the foreign desperation in those blue eyes did Akko stop. A part of her wanted to twist _harder_ because Diana was strong and Akko knew she could take it – but she also knew that if she did something would snap and there would be no coming back from that. They were too new at this, too raw, nowhere near ready.

“Save it.” Akko said wearily, and it was like the fight had gone out of her. “Sorry. I think I pushed too far.”

She spread her fingers out slowly and let the twinge of each bruise run their course through her hand. “It’s just that, sometimes I see you holding yourself back. And I don’t understand why.”

Diana let out the tiniest breath and leaned against the brick wall, turning her head to escape those red eyes.

Then she let the snake that was curled around her heart unwind itself, little by little. Not all the way, but enough to give herself room to breathe.

“I’m not doing it on purpose.” Her voice was cold, she noted, the way it always was when she was trying to control herself. A world of difference, a hundred degrees between her and Akko. “My aunt, she always made sure I never – that I always-”

She’s stuttering _again_ but that hardly matters because now Akko is filling her vision, two fingers forcing her chin up, that insistent gaze peering into all the brackish parts of her. “Your aunt isn’t here.”

Diana stared back, feeling the warmth of Akko’s breath swirl against her cheek. “I know that now,” How could she not, she wondered, with Akko embedded so deep into her soul, growing and growing until there was no space for anything else.

“But that’s not the only reason.” Akko surmised, stealing secrets away again. Diana blinked.

“No.”

Akko didn’t say anything. _Your choice_ , her eyes seemed to say, _your secret_.

But the idea of keeping secrets from Akko after everything they’d said, today and the week before, felt unfair. Akko hadn’t hesitated to curb her temper tantrums when Diana was near. The most vulnerable part of her, as explosive as it was.

“I.” Her throat bobbed as she swallowed, and she watched as Akko’s eyes tracked the movement. “I thought that maybe… I wanted to try, for you. I wanted to help you hide. Because I’ve had practice, being perfect.

“I thought that maybe I could be perfect for the both of us.”

Akko blinked. A split-second of surprise before it was replaced entirely by pure wonder.

“Oh, Diana,” Akko crooned, bending down just enough so that they’re foreheads were lightly touching. Blood rushed through her fingertips, her face, warmed the pit of her stomach at the contact and the slight derisiveness in Akko’s voice. “I would never stop you from pretending around other people. But you don’t have to be perfect around _me_.”

“Yes.” She croaked out. Suddenly it felt like there wasn’t any air to breathe. “Okay.”

Akko stayed for a second, longer, before she backed off. The temperature seemed to drop a few degrees lower the instant those hands weren’t at her chin.

“Were you serious about it, by the way? Those lessons?”

Diana took a moment to take stock of herself and her racing heart, before she answered. “Of course. They should have given you a tutor earlier, in my opinion. It’s ridiculous to expect you to keep up with the others, considering the advantage they have in terms of growing up in magical environments.”

Akko smiled lightly, laughter dancing in her eyes. _There she is_ , she thought to herself. _Perfect Diana again, but softer around the edges._ “So, if I were to ask you to tutor me…”

“Tonight.” Diana said, her tone of voice brooking no argument. “At least so I can assess what level you are, what you need help with the most.”

Akko grinned fully this time. “Boy, you’re going to be a slave driver aren’t you, Ms Cavendish?”

“Don’t you have a class to get to?”

“The same one as yours.” Akko challenged, before sticking out an elbow. “Come on. I don’t want to be late.”

“That’s news to me.”

“Your _face_ is news to me.” Akko grumbled, the bond sparking good naturedly before subsiding as they neared other people. A few of the students looked at their joined elbows curiously before looking away, eyebrows raised as if to say _go figure_.

Today hadn’t resolved everything, not really. But they’d taken two steps further, and that was enough for now.

\---

“Akko?”

“In here!”

An arm shot out of the nowhere and before she could yelp, she was pulled into an empty classroom.

“Isn’t it awesome?” Akko exclaimed, spreading her arms out wide as she jumped up and down. “There are _tons_ of classrooms like these in the south wing, all abandoned so the teachers will never think to check in!”

Diana looked around. The classrooms looked like duplicates of the everyday ones they had their classes in, excepting the layer of dust that seemed to coat everything. She walked over to the first row of seats, running a finger down the surface of a desk.

“Bless you,” Akko said absentmindedly as she sneezed. Then she nudged her with an elbow, eyes sparkling. “So? Is it good enough?”

Diana folded her arms and eyed the double doors. Were they thick enough to muffle the sounds of their spell casting? Would the walls of the classroom, neglected and old as they were, be able to handle rebound spells?

“If we get caught…” She said warningly. Akko just rolled her eyes and hopped up on the desk next to her.

“We won’t. We have you.”

And just like that, Diana’s resolve cracked as the flush of praise sang in her blood. She prayed Akko didn’t feel it.

After a beat Diana conceded, shaking her head. “All right. But you need to take my lessons seriously, Akko. I’m not risking a mark on my record on wasted time.”

“I’ll do my best to make our time here worth your while.”

Diana suppressed a smile at the words. She was saved from having to reply as the other witch abruptly stood up, dusting her hands off. “All right! What’s on the agenda, Ms Cavendish?”

“Don’t call me that,” she deadpanned. “First, I need to assess you. See what areas you’re weakest in.”

Akko snorted. “That’s easy. Anything that requires magic.”

“What areas specifically- oh.” Diana aimed a flat look at her. “You’re joking.”

“Lighten up friend-o! Enjoy the thrill of sneaking out of your dorm, staying up past eight pm and – Diana. Diana, I’m sorry, I was kidding! Diana no don’t go!”

Those meetings had started out fairly simple. Just the same thing over and over again, Akko coming to her with a new topic she couldn’t grasp properly, Diana trying to teach her how to reach in for that hidden pool of magic. Once in a while Akko would break chairs, tables, scuff the walls in fits of rage. Diana would only try to find ways to turn fixing those broken things into lessons.

And once or twice, Akko would hurt herself. Not enough to warrant a visit to the clinic, but enough to warrant a few concerned looks and a quick stop to the tutoring.

“Akko,” Diana started, zeroing in on what was a bruised knuckle at best and a fractured one at worst. “that needs a cast.”

She’d always reply in the same manner, tight-lipped and serious. “No infirmaries.”

“You aren’t being rational about this.”

Akko let out a little laugh, but it was flatter than usual. “When have you ever known me to be rational about _anything_? Besides, you know by now that I know how to heal myself.”

Diana frowned at that. Any complex magic done on yourself or conjured up by you required intimate knowledge of the action of the spell without the magic involved. Strong fire magic meant you’d spent months or more around it, inhaling its smoke and stomping around in the ash it left behind. Water magic meant you understood the silken way it raced across your body, the transparent marks it tracked down your skin.

What did it say about Akko, she wondered, that she couldn’t preform the most basic of spells, but that her self-healing was extraordinarily instinctive?

She shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts away. “Still, you need-”

“Diana.” Akko said, in that tone of voice that didn’t try to hide the snarl underneath. “You have my mind. I’d gladly open it to you, every ugly part of it because I _trust_ you – but let me keep my body. Okay?”

_I trust you_. The words bounced around in Diana’s skull.

“Okay.”

\---

“Are you and Diana okay now?”

Akko turned to look at Lotte, meeting that curious green gaze over her mound of tater tots and boiled potatoes. “Whaddaya mean?”

“I mean, have you stopped fighting?”

She took half a second to force the smile on her face not to twitch suspiciously. “We never were.”

“Really?” Lotte asked, pushing the end of her spoon up against her bottom lip. “Cause it sort of seemed like you were, back in the field.”

“Lotte, that was a week ago!” Akko laughed, showing her teeth in the most unobtrusive way possible. “And I really wasn’t mad at her. I mean, why would I ever be mad at Diana?”

This time Sucy looked up from her own bland lunch to stare pointedly at her. “I have a theory.”

And immediately, Lotte’s face burst into a flaming red, the freckles on the bridge of her nose burning a shade darker. “No, you _don’t_.”

“It’s a very good theory.”

“It isn’t.” Lotte said insistently, eyes darting from Akko, to Sucy, to the place Diana usually sat when she wasn’t off helping the teachers or some lost janitor. “It very much isn’t.”

The three of them were locked in a stare down – or at least, Sucy and Akko were, with Lotte hovering anxiously in the background.

Akko narrowed her eyes suspiciously, knowing she looked ridiculous and harmless even as her impatience brushed up against the periphery of Diana’s mind. “What are you saying?”

“Nothing.”

“ _Sucy_.”

“Akko.”

“Lotte!” Akko turned to Lotte, whining. “What does Sucy meannn?”

“She – it’s. Um.” Her glasses cracked. Akko watched it spider-web to the opposite side of its origin point. “I’m going to go put my lunch tray away now.”

Akko huffed, gathering up her lunch tray too, sending a dark look over at Sucy as she did the same. “I’m coming with you.”

It happened as the trio walked down the hall to get to their next class.

Akko could sense Diana approaching, could feel it in the way it was gradually getting easier to hear the melodic drum of her emotions. First were the surface-level ones Diana had every day, the ambition, the impossibly warm kindness, the dedication she had to her work.

And over time, Akko had discovered that there was distress lurking somewhere under that brick wall. She’d seeped in through the cracks little by little, and she’d found it – the little knob of need for perfection, always too intense to be anything but desperation.

But now there was a new surface emotion – embarrassment.

Speaking of, Diana always knew Akko was coming closer for the same reasons Akko did, and she never failed to push on the bond a little as a greeting. Why wasn’t she doing anything now?

Lotte was speaking to Sucy at her side, a hushed argument that probably had something to do about lunch, but all of that faded to background noise the minute they rounded the corner.

Ah. So that’s what the embarrassment was for.

“And I just wanted to s-say. That.”

Akko watched as a first-year student looked up at Diana with shining eyes, lips trembling, before she suddenly pushed both of her hands out. Clasped between her fingers was a pink envelope, taped closed with a cute heart-shaped sticker and everything.

_Oh._

“I really admire you and I wondering if maybe you want to go to the city with me this weekend!”

From where she was standing she could only see half of Diana’s face. The edges of her mouth were pulled into the shape of something that resembled a grimace more than a smile, but the floating wisps of embarrassment still radiated through the bond.

Akko wasn’t sure if she liked that.

Before she knew just what she was doing, she reached into her mind, gripped the link with mental grasping hands, and _yanked_ as hard as she could.

The effects were instantaneous – Diana immediately snapped her face in her direction, eyes drawn wide in surprise for a second before the perfect student mask shuttered them closed.

Beside her, Lotte and Sucy skidded to a stop.

“What are – oh my!”

Sucy took a second to snort before remarking drily, “Oh, it’s like your night fall books.”

“Diana?” The first year asked tentatively, and all too soon that cold blue stare left Akko.

Akko watched, stock still for a moment. She touched down on the link but all she could feel were surface levels of embarrassment that were growing more intense by the minute, all of them covering some unidentified feeling underneath.

None of that reflected on Diana’s face, of course, because Diana was perfect and by extension her mask was too.

“I appreciate you asking me…”

And that was enough. This was voyeuristic.

_Also,_ Akko privately reflected, _I think I might do something incredibly stupid if I stay here._

Before Diana could finish what was no doubt a confirmation, Akko turned on her heel and started walking down the hallway, barely registering the surprise on Lotte’s face and what amounted to smug glee on Sucy’s.

Because hearing Diana’s words was one thing, but seeing the look on that obnoxious first-year’s face after she said yes?

She set her teeth and kept walking. So what? It was just one weekend. She and Diana were still friends, no matter what came out of it.

_Why am I so bothered by this_?

“Um…” Lotte said, voice a little confused. “The classroom is the opposite way.”

“I know Lotte.”

“Looks like my theory isn’t just a theory any-”

The little oof Sucy gave as the ginger jabbed her in the stomach was the most satisfying thing Akko had heard all day.

“Akko?” Lotte spoke up after a moment of silence, breaking the empty sound of their shoes clicking against the floor. “Are you okay?”

Akko exhaled before smiling so wide she could swear the corners of her mouth were splitting. “I don’t know what you mean Lotte, I’m fine.”

Lotte nodded, but the worry didn’t seem to leave those green eyes for the rest of the day.

\---

For the hundredth time since she’d been connected to Akko, Diana couldn’t bring herself to concentrate in class. This wasn’t unusual by any means, but today was _different_.

Usually Akko’s emotions were on loud speaker, an occasional earthquake that rumbled along and left everything disorganized. It never failed to leave Diana in lurch, always wondering what minor inconvenience had riled the brunette up so much this time. Now however, instead of being side tracked by that almost oppressive force of nature that kept zipping her way, she was distracted by how quiet it was being. A silence that was oppressive in an entirely different way.

She thought back to what Akko had seen earlier. The girl, standing there with her envelope, Akko coming in and seeing it with the damned heart sticker and the cursive handwriting…

A blush came to her face unbidden. How embarrassing! She’d sent the girl away as gently as she could, citing almost every reason as to why she was unavailable – _student council duties that day, and I have to assist the teachers with the exorcism of a haunted item found in the library, the gardening club with the flowering moon plants, very busy day for me_ – before hastily speed walking away.

To think that Akko had walked in just in time to see her make an absolute fool of herself, staring at the girl with what probably felt like shame being broadcasted across their mental link was- was _embarrassing_!

She grit her teeth, tightening her fingers around her pen.

“Um, Diana?”

She flinched, quickly turning to look at Hannah. Her roommate backed up a little at the slight movement.

“Yes?”

“Are you okay?”

“Perfectly all right.”

“Then why…?”

Diana arched an eyebrow. In response, Hannah pointed at the ink stains covering her fingers from where the pen had broken.

A few seconds of silence ensued. She cleared her throat quietly and quickly waved the mess away before taking a new pen out of her bag.

For a while only the monotone voice of principal Holbrooke’s voice cut into the air. And then-

“Are you sure you’re-”

“I’m _fine_.”

\---

Diana still wasn’t inside the empty classroom they regularly used for training by the time Akko had made it there.

She snorted to herself. Should have expected this. It was possible the blonde wouldn’t even come today at all because she was too busy with –

An image of her with the first year flashed insistently in her mind before she had a chance to bat it away.

She shouldn’t really care so much. If a first year had done that to Lotte, or to Amanda, or to – and god help any poor soul who did this – Sucy, she would have teased them mercilessly and maybe taken a picture or two, or joined in on the inevitable jeering.

But with Diana… for some reason all she wanted to do with Diana was punt whoever was beside her into the stratosphere. It was nice there. She would know.

Akko frowned, sitting on a table and leaning back on the flat of her palms. The idea of her enjoying a day in the town with the girl made her feel slightly nauseated and angry all at the same time, made her feel like she wanted to punch something with one hand and hold Diana closer with another.

But _why_? 

“Good evening.”

“Diana!”

They both paused at the sound of sheer relief in Akko’s voice. Cursing, Akko mentally reached into her mind and tried to yank her emotions back in. How loud were they broadcasting right now? Could Diana feel all the confusion, the discontent?

“Akko are you-”

“I’m fine!” The brunette blurted out, stepping a little closer to where she was still standing by the entrance. “I’m fine, sorry. Thinking about a lot of things.”

Diana stared at her, the ice blue of her eyes a bit more piercing than usual. “You were… a little quiet today.”

Akko tilted her head. They’d barely seen each other today, aside from when – anyway. “What do you mean?”

The blue sharpened just that bit more, before dulling down to the usual calm. “Nothing. Maybe I was imagining things.”

“Diana-”

“We stopped at the summoning spell last time, yes?” Diana cut in, expression closed off, professional. “I think it was wand movement you had trouble with.”

Akko frowned. On any other day, she would have pushed further. Except on any other day, the image of Diana wanting to be anywhere that wasn’t _here_ with Akko wouldn’t be prevalent in her mind.

“All right.” She muttered bitterly. “Wand movement.”

Unsurprisingly, it only took about an hour for Akko to stand back, leaning against a desk in defeat. An hour of tense silence, only broken by the occasional remark Diana made to _lift your hand up higher as you swish – not that high!_ Before she acknowledged the fact that there was no way she was going to pass tomorrow’s practical exam.

“Why are you so distracted today?” Diana finally snapped, crossing her arms and levelling those cold blue eyes at her. “I know you can do much better than this-”

There’s disappointment in her words and Akko just.

“Oh, I’m sorry. Am I not good enough for you now, princess? Now that you have better options?”

Diana stops mid-sentence, lips falling open in surprise. “What do you mean by that?”

“I-” Akko starts, before stopping abruptly like her words have just caught up to her. “Nothing. I didn’t mean anything by it.”

And then before she can stop it the split-second of uncertainty chips just that little bit more away at the cracks in her resolve. She has a single moment to widen her eyes in horror before every emotion she was desperately trying to hold back comes pouring out. 

Diana meets her gaze at first, confused, then startles when the mind link almost bursts open, a flood of intensity that does nothing to hide an underlying emotion, a feeling that’s almost uncomfortably familiar –

Back in those days when Diana had seen Akko get too chummy with O’Neill, back when she didn’t have Akko unapologetically and irrevocably glued to her, back when Akko didn’t greedily share in her soul the way she did hers…

Jealousy. Back then, it had been jealousy that clogged her throat up. Now, it was jealousy pouring across their bond.

And then she takes another second to examine her thoughts, because _jealousy_?

“Akko.” She breathed out, closing the distance between them with a tiny step. “Akko, listen-”

“We’ll continue this some other time.” The brunette snaps, and then she’s off. The tips of her ears are a blotchy red but they’re quickly hidden by the brown tangle of her hair as she walks away.

Diana stops. Sits down on a desk and puts her head in her hands, wonders why she feels guilty elation shooting to the very tips of her fingertips.

And then she huffs because being interrupted all the time is starting to get real old.

\---

They’re going to have to talk about it at some point, Akko thinks to herself. It’s going to be horribly awkward if they don’t.

It’s already kind of horribly awkward because of how they seem to be walking on eggshells around each other now, and she misses the easy smiles that used to come from bumping into Diana in the hallways. A few days of walking the other way whenever she sees Diana anywhere near and she’s already sick of it.

Except – except the thought of owning up to her juvenile feelings makes reflexive anger boil up to the surface, enough that she’s sure Dian’s getting emotional backlash at every time of the day, enough that she’s sure she’s distracting the blonde even more from her studies and her rightful place at the top of the academy.

So, she does what she does best, and she _suppresses_.

Which is why she does her best not to give any sign that she’s noticed Diana coming into the library from where she sits at a table with Lotte and Sucy, even though the feedback from the mind link is loud enough to make her wince internally for a few seconds.

She buries herself even more into her books and tries to ignore the budding headache and the traitorous whispers of _if Diana were here she’d be able to explain that concept to you a lot better_ , choosing instead to repeat paragraphs to herself over and over until she feels like she understands the lesson – if only by pure memorization.

And it works for a while. Almost too well, long moments passing by as Diana’s presence fades into the background, getting fuzzier and fuzzier until –

“Hello.”

Startled, she looks up and sees Diana facing her. Akko blinks. How long has she been there? Why didn’t she feel her coming closer, what does she say?

Diana looks a little like she didn’t sleep all that well last night, but the bags on her eyes do nothing to detract from how beautifully cold she looks and _what does she say_?

From the corner of her eyes she can see Lotte and Sucy looking at her weird so she settles for a lame “Hi.” back.

Another moment of silence. Diana swallows, a tiny gesture that others would dismiss but one that Akko understands as her being _uncomfortable_ , before pointing at one of the empty chairs across the brunette. “Would you mind if I sat here?”

Akko takes exactly one second to panic internally, before pasting a useless smile on her face. Diana knows it’s fake anyway. She always does.

“Oh, of course not! You can have the whole table to yourself actually, we were just leaving.”

Lotte looks up from where she was highlighting a passage in her textbook, decidedly _not_ ready to leave. “We were?”

“We were.” Akko repeats firmly, getting up quickly and tugging on her friend’s arms. It takes everything in her not to look at Diana, knowing she’d find only curiosity, frustration (and maybe a little bit of hurt) there.

“Wait-” The blonde tries to interject, “Akko, I didn’t mean-”

“Don’t you worry Diana, we’ll be out of your hair soon enough!”

Before she can be dragged in again by that crisp blue gaze she speed-walks across the library, almost running in her haste to get to the exit, bodily dragging her friends behind her. The hardwood floors finally give way to marble as she rushes into the hallway, only daring to look back once she’s sure there are at least ten metres between them and the exit, and then only daring to actually stop once she hasn’t felt Diana’s side of the mind link flare up in a while.

She lets go of Sucy and Lotte’s hands then, wiping her palms on her thighs and panting as she lets all of her stress wash over. Unbeknownst to her, Lotte and Sucy exchange glances over the top of her back.

This isn’t actually an uncommon occurrence, Akko dragging them away from a place at ridiculous speeds. The _uncommon_ thing about this is that there aren’t any screaming teachers chasing after them, or any ridiculously buff security guards trying to tackle them to the ground.

Lotte is the first to speak up, brows furrowed.

“Akko what-”

“Akko.” Sucy deadpans. “I hope you like waking up to mushrooms growing out of your ears.”

Akko opens her mouth to say something that hopefully doesn’t sound insane, but another voice pipes in, saying,

**Why are you avoiding me?**

That particular voice sounds almost extraordinarily like Diana’s. She decides to ignore it. It might be her conscience. Her conscience has been very annoying lately.

“Sorry. I’m just – I was. I was done studying.”

Lotte frowns. “You were _studying_?”

Akko recoils reflexively at that. A defensive comeback is ready on her lips before Sucy cuts in, announcing readily in her dry monotone voice,

“You were avoiding Diana.”

_This_ time Akko recoils a lot harder. “I wasn’t!”

“You were.”

Lotte looks between them, lost. “You were?”

It’s an almost déjà vu-ish repeat of what happened before. Akko sighs exasperatedly. “I wasn’t. That’s ridiculous Sucy, why would I be avoiding her?”

The pale witch’s expression barely twitches. “I don’t know Akko, you tell me.”

Akko’s starting to get a little annoyed at how cavalier the with is being about the whole thing. What does she even _know_ anyway about all the weird shit that’s happening between her and Diana? Where does she get off telling her –

Deep breath. Diana is trying to _study_.

“There’s nothing to tell.”

“It doesn’t seem like it.”

“Guys,” Lotte starts, ever the mediator. “Don’t fight.”

“We’re not fighting.” Sucy says with the slightest downward tilt to her mouth, and it’s the closest Akko has ever seen her to snapping at Lotte. “I’m just trying to get Akko to see that whatever feud she has with Cavendish is starting to become a little bit inconvenient.”

“Inconvenient how?”

Sucy tilts her head a little. “Finishing lunch would be nice. You dragged us out of there yesterday just because Diana looked at you for half a second.”

“That was one time!”

“Well…”

Akko whips her head around to stare at the ginger. She’s adjusting her glasses and very carefully not meeting her eyes. “Lotte?!”

“I mean, there was that time on the field too…” and then she hesitates like she doesn’t know if she should keep going, lowering her voice a bit “…and the other day at the library again…”

“But-” Akko sputters, “It’s not like that, I swear! I’m not avoiding her, I just-”

“You’re just _avoiding_ her.” Sucy deadpans again.

Right before Akko opens her mouth to let all those hurtful words she has ready on the tip of her tongue spew out of her like a fire hydrant, she stops. Actually contemplates what they’re telling her, goes over the events of the past few days. Thinks of each interaction frame-by-frame.

She’s been biding her time! Waiting for the right moment to talk over whatever weird thing happened that night!

And _maybe_ , just _maybe_ in the meantime, she’d found herself avoiding Diana. Just a little bit more than she thought she was.

Akko looks up, at Lotte then at Sucy, then at Lotte again. “I guess – I guess I’ve been a bit weird lately?”

Sucy snorts then lets out a little oof at the elbow Lotte delivers to her ribs. Akko has the _best_ friends.

“Why, Akko? Did something happen?” The ginger asks. Her eyes are wide and magnified behind her glasses. It’d be like kicking a puppy to deny this girl anything she wants and Akko hates kicking puppies.

“Not really,” Akko hedges, scrubbing awkwardly at the back of her neck.

“ _Akko_.” Sucy says, exasperated, and Akko winces.

“It’s not a big deal, I swear! Just-” she cuts herself off, lets Lotte coax her on with a dragged out, “Jussst…?”

Akko sighs. “Do you remember when we walked in on Diana a few days ago? When that first year was giving Diana the envelope, the _pink_ one with the hearts, and then she-”

Her throat closes off before she can say the words, but it’s okay because Akko really has the _best_ friends, and Lotte, eyes glinting with recognition, says, “When that first year confessed to her?”

Sucy chokes on air. Akko hopes she suffocates and dies.

“Yeah.” She shifts her shoulders around uselessly, not knowing what to do with them. “I don’t know. I felt all weird after that and I know it sounds bad but I went off on her a little because of it, and now it’s embarrassing because I think she felt-” _Wait no_ , she backtracks, _they don’t know about the mind link_ , “-because I think she thinks she did something wrong.”

They’re still staring at her, but something in Sucy’s expression’s changed, like she’s staring at an especially defective mushroom. “And I don’t know how to tell her that she didn’t do anything wrong and that I’m sorry for being weird without making it more embarrassing.”

“And now you’re avoiding her.”

“And now I’m avoiding her.” Akko repeats Lotte’s words miserably, finally allowing herself to push all of her reflexive anger down enough so she can berate herself for being so _stupid_. Does Diana think she’s avoiding her? With the mind link she’s always taken the blonde’s understanding for granted, but she has to remind herself – again and _again_ – that the mind link is not _mind reading_. It’s emotions, and emotions are only felt. They aren’t clear-cut. They aren’t words.

Oh my god Diana definitely thinks she’s avoiding her. This is going to be so painfully awkward.

“Akko, wait.” Sucy says, cutting into the turmoil of her mind. “Akko, were you _jealous_?”

Count on Sucy to say whatever she wanted, overhanging danger of a bruised pride and all. 

“No!” _Yes_? “I didn’t like it, is all.”

Even as she’s saying the words she can hear how ridiculous she sounds. Sucy’s smiling, teeth sharp, like she’s got her fit and snug in one of her traps. “Why didn’t you like it?”

Akko fish-mouths for a bit, looking for any way out of answering truthfully. Lotte’s earnest face meets her gaze, Sucy’s shrewd one at her side.

It’s not the end of the world. She could run away because she’s gotten _way_ more fit and Sucy’s long witch robe is sure to trip her up, which means Lotte would stop to help her and – and.

She sighs, quashing the idea down because they’ve been through so much, the three of them. She can depend on them for anything, anything at all, whether it’s saving the world trouble or stupid friend trouble, and if she can’t talk to _them_ then how is she ever going to get up the nerve to talk to _Diana_?

(And okay. Maybe she _does_ owe them an answer given how annoying she’s made their lives the past few days, now that she thinks about it properly.)

“I didn’t like it because – because she’s mine, isn’t she?” She doesn’t look up, doesn’t notice Sucy’s eyes widening out of that half-lidded stare, doesn’t see Lotte’s freckles dusting a darker pink at the words. “And I’m hers. Always. It’s – you don’t interfere with that. Of course I was bothered.”

As she speaks she realizes that she means every single word. It doesn’t even have to be said at this point, does it? Akko frowns to herself. She’s always taken Diana being part of her soul for granted, she never thought people would think otherwise.

A surge of _possessive_ anger rises up this time. How _dare_ that first year think otherwise.

“Uh.” Lotte gapes. “Wow.”

“Uh-huh.” Sucy agrees from beside her.

When Akko looks up to meet their stares head-on she’s confronted by a mix of incredulity and what looks almost like embarrassment on Lotte’s face – a similar expression to that one time they’d walked in on two third years necking unashamedly in a broom closet they were planning on hiding in.

“What?” She prompts, when none of them say anything else.

There’s a beat of silence before Sucy starts cackling, her sharp teeth widened into a hysterical grin.

“I was _right_!”

“Sucy!” Lotte wails, tugging on her sleeve uselessly to try and stop the laughter. “You’re being very cruel!”

“But I was _right_ Lotte!” This is the happiest Akko has seen her without a mushroom in hand and it’s vaguely alarming. “How long have I been trying to tell you?”

“What’s so funny?!” And really, _nothing_ about this is funny because she still has to talk to Diana and the lowest simmers of frustration are starting to heat her belly up, stoked by Sucy’s incessant cackling.

None of them pay her any mind. Lotte looks like she’s about to cry, actually, and another crack has appeared on the lens of her glasses.

“You’re a dunce, Akko.”

“ _Sucy_!”

“But it’s true!”

“What? _Why_?” Akko huffs, eyebrows furrowing.

Sucy opens her mouth, looks like she’s going to say something – and then stops when she sees something over Akko’s shoulder.

All of a sudden, she starts laughing harder. Lotte looks too and immediately turns a brighter red. 

Before Akko herself can say turn around or say anything else (or strangle Sucy with her own belt), the bell rings. A flood of students come pouring out of nowhere and Akko has no choice but to be carried by the tide of first years down to her next class.

The hallway is crowded and drowning in the noisy chatter of hundreds of students but she _swears_ she can still hear Sucy’s laughing haunting her down the hall.

And since the hallway is so crowded and her mind is in a similar state, she doesn’t notice dazed blue _blue_ eyes burning into her back.

\---

_“Because she’s mine, isn’t she? And I’m hers. Always.”_

The words won’t stop replaying in her mind.

_“You don’t interfere with that.”_

Not for the first time, Diana wonders what it would be like to have Akko take whatever she wants from her. They take from each other all the time now anyway, sharing in a bond that seems like it exists only to make them more and more co-dependent.

Diana doesn’t mind that, now that she thinks about it. The only thing better than having Akko close where she can feel the fire of her words lick over her arms, is having Akko _closer_. Taking up all the space in her head, planting herself firmly into the very roots of her heart.

_I’m hers_. Diana decides, finally. _And she’s mine_. There’s no question about it.

Hearing Akko say those words was only a shock in the first place because of how absolutely fitting they felt, after all.

And it should be terrifying, how ready she feels to have Akko use everything up in her until there’s nothing left, but it isn’t. They will be together, and they will stay together and it just feels sort of inevitable, like fate or destiny or whatever it is her schoolmates prattle on about whenever Andrew comes to visit.

Now if only she could corner Akko long enough to let the brunette _know_ that. The witch is all over the place nowadays, scrambling her emotions enough that it’s hard to pin down where she is, harder still to actually get to her when she’s alone. When she isn’t hanging off of Lotte and Sucy, she’s tugging on Amanda so they can go flying (and Diana simply grits her teeth when she sees this, because they are each other’s so it would be silly to get jealous), or wreaking general havoc in some crowded hallway full of wide-eyed first years.

It’s _infuriating_ , not the least because Diana’s gotten used to having that red river of emotion slugging its way through her mind. She genuinely just misses Akko, misses the way her blood runs a little hotter under her skin when they’re touching.

But clearly, trying to chase her down is getting her _nowhere_ , so she simply gives in. Waits for the brunette to come to her.

It probably won’t be long now, she thinks, trying to console herself. Of the two of them, one is markedly more impatient than the other.

\---

It takes two days.

\---

Diana can feel Akko staring at her. Every time she turns around though, the brunette is determinedly looking at something else, mouth pressed into a tight line. She feels twitchy and on edge today, helped along by the fact that Akko _herself_ feels twitchy and on edge today.

She supresses her own frown. If they were talking, if Akko still showed up to their training sessions, some of that energy might have been worked off.

Judging by the occasional looks Hannah and Barbara throw her way, she’s sure they’ve noticed.

When the bell rings she doesn’t really _run_ so much as speed-walk to the teacher’s desk to ask professor Finnelan if she needs help with something. It’s not her fault the teacher’s had trouble with one of the cursed artefacts hidden away on the third floor of the library. It’s not her fault the inscription’s written in a language only Diana is readily familiar with.

As she walks away the peripherals of familiar red _writhe_ at the edges of her mind. She swallows, tries not to turn around and run straight to Akko with her burning words and her iron-brand fingers.

\---

It takes two days and three hours.

\---

She walked through a deserted hallway on her way back to class, head full of ancient curses and nothing else so it was a little bit of a surprise when Akko skidded to a stop in front of her, chest heaving with exertion.

Her brown hair was as frizzy as it usually was after lunch period and her skin was covered in a light sheen of sweat but that didn’t matter because those were _very_ long strides she was taking and oh-

Diana pressed her lips together. “Akko, you don’t need to corner me against a wall every time you have to-”

“I’m not avoiding you!”

Akko blurted out, eyes going wide the minute the words left her mouth.

She stared. Akko stared back. On the midnight side of the world, crickets chirped merrily.

The tension slowly left Diana’s shoulders. “You certainly have a funny way of showing it.”

“But I’m not! I swear, I-” Akko lifted one of her hands off the wall to fist at her own hair. “I just – I don’t know how to say this.”

The blonde shifted the tiniest bit closer. “Try.”

A few more moments of dead silence and far-away cricket chirping. 

“I was being childish.” Akko finally grit out, looking everywhere but at her. “And jealous,” she said but faster this time, like the words are poison in her mouth. “And I took that out on you which I shouldn’t have done-”

“Why not?”

She watched Akko shutter, crimson eyes finally snapping up to meet hers. “What do you mean why not?

“We did agree, didn’t we? That we wouldn’t hold back. Not against each other.” Diana’s breath quickened a little as the mind link crackled to life and a flood of emotions burst forth. Two days was too long without the rush she felt from this, the overwhelming barrage of energy. “You see all of me…”

She reached up to take Akko’s hand and untangled it from the mess of her hair, moving it down down down so it rested at the base of her throat, splayed over her thrumming heart. “And I see all of you.”

Akko watched their joined hands with wide-eyes, the red deepening further into something undefinable. “Diana.”

She hummed in assent. “You said you were jealous, Akko. Why?”

Okay, so maybe Diana was egging her on but it had been a _week_.

Her eyes drooped a little at the instant irritation that itched between them. Not hers but Akko’s, a seemingly infinite pool of it only intensified by the proximity.

She knew why. Sucy and Lotte knew why. But hearing it said from afar was _nothing_ compared to this, two melded souls in a deserted hallway.

“You’re _mine_.” Akko snarled suddenly, using the hand on her chest to push her back further into the wall. “You’re mine and you always _will be_ and I don’t get why no one _understands_ that.” Her face loomed closer until the freckles seemed to blur out of existence and the only thing left was red, dark and honeyed.

“I’m yours.” She breathed out, sighing in relief when finally _finally_ the full extent of the bond snicked back into place. Akko crowded into her like she was trying to burrow under her skin, eyes still narrowed in implacable rage.

The hand crept the slightest bit upwards until her thumb was stroking at the bony edges of her windpipe, fingers splayed outward. “You’re not going to let that girl anywhere near you.”

Diana looked up at her from heavy lids, the blue ice in them melting. “I’m not?”

“You’re not.” Akko muttered, surveying the stretch of skin under her hands. “Not her or any other idiot who thinks they can just come up and _take_ -”

And then the rest of her words were muffled as she nosed into Diana’s skin, licking her way down the side of her neck to the little hollow in her collarbone. Diana gasped at the feeling, arching into it and clutching desperately at Akko’s hair to ground herself because it felt like she was floating off of the floor and somewhere into the sky.

Akko nipped at the skin in places, growling low in her throat when Diana flinched. Now and then she’d let go of a darkening patch of skin, pressing little kisses into the bruises and repeating her broken mantra of _mine, mine, mine, no one else’s._

The bell rang but the brunette didn’t pay it any mind, pushing in even closer and shoving a knee between Diana’s legs to steady her. 

“ _Akko-_ ” Diana gasped out. “Akko, class is starting.”

The brunette let go of the side of her neck with a pop, lips plush and red but she didn’t pull back just yet.

“No one else.”

“What?” The blonde asked blearily, wondering why it felt like her legs would give out at any moment.

“We are each others. No one else’s.”

The knee shoved _in_ , shoved _higher_ , and she gasped before babbling yes, _yes_ , no one else’s, of course not. Before she could stop herself her lips slackened, loose as they slipped out an, “I missed you.”

The thick air around them smoothed out into something softer, not as charged as before but no less molten. “I missed you too.” Akko admitted. “I’m sorry I was being so stupid.”

“You might as well apologize for breathing.”

“Diana why are you so _mean_?” Akko whined, pulling back to pout a little. “I’m trying to be nice!”

“And _I’m_ trying to get to class on time.” Diana deadpanned, patting at her hair in an attempt to get it back to a semi-presentable state. Akko pouted even more but helped her, laughing a little at how unkempt her own hair was – and then laughing even harder the minute she saw Diana’s neck.

“Oh my god it looks like a bear mauled you!”

“And who’s fault is that?” Diana sighed out exasperatedly, tuning out the brunette’s cackling. Just a simple illusion spell would do the trick, figure 8 in the air with her wand and a muttered incantation…

“Aww, don’t be like that Diana.” Akko teased. “It seemed like you really liked the bear-”

Diana pushed past her lightly, forcing the flush out of her face. “That’s enough out of you.” she breezed, speed-walking but not running (a technique she’d indirectly learned from her etiquette lessons) down the hall toward her class. Akko joined her a few seconds later, still wheezing with laughter.

An arm wrapped around her waist, pulling her in closer. “I think the bear really liked it too.” Akko whispered conspiratorially before smiling that cheek-splitting grin. The mind bond hummed and settled between them, and if it weren’t for the immense feeling of satisfaction emitting from Akko Diana might have found it in herself to be properly embarrassed.

\--- **PRESENT TIME** \---

That was the first time, but certainly not the last. As soon as Akko decided she liked the look on Diana she’d ambushed her whenever she could, in empty hallways, empty classrooms and on one especially bad day when she’d felt restless, the guarded staff bathrooms on the second floor. It wasn’t long until a new one almost immediately appeared the minute an old one would start to fade.

And if Diana had been any less perfect, the illusions she constantly spelled on would slip and the mottled purple-red of her skin would be displayed for all to see.

(She quashed the small thrill that shot through her at the thought. _One_ of them had to be rational, and from the way Akko eyed the markings it definitely had to be Diana.)

But the minute Akko’s fist dug into her stomach, knuckles bruising the flesh of her abdomen and making contact with everything underneath, any semblance of control dropped and the hickies popped right back into existence.

Akko reared back, presumably to ready for a counterattack – but she stopped short at the sight of Diana’s neck.

“You can’t-” Akko swallowed. Her eyes were trained on the marks, almost obnoxiously territorial in their statement of _mineminemine_. One foot shifted unsteadily forward. “Unfair, Diana.”

Diana gingerly pressed a few fingers to her stomach, wondering at the slightest little sparks that sprang up at the touch. “Under the circumstances, I find that hard to believe.”

She slowly straightened up, ignoring the throbbing in her stomach. “Is this the extent of your anger, Akko?”

Red eyes snapped to hers and the truth barged its way to the front.

Diana exhaled. Relished the slow-drip of emotion as it warmed her skin. “Then give me _all of it_.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (did i take the whole ‘familiarize yourself with the aspect of the thing before u make magic out of it’ concept from hunter x hunter? u betcha I did.)
> 
> And if this felt like a filler chapter that’s because it was! Look at all that self-indulgency. (fair warning this entire fic is going to be full of self-indulgency but you’re very much welcome to read it)


End file.
